Despite their ideological differences, Justices Antonin Scalia and Ruth Bader Ginsburg bond over their shared love for the opera. Both judicial luminaries attended Saturday’s opening night performance of Ariadne auf Naxos, at the Washington National Opera. If you’re into Article III celebrity sightings, the D.C. opera house is where it’s at.

Not only did the justices attend the opera; they also participated. An eyewitness evaluation of their performances, plus a photo of Justice Scalia with a sexy soprano in his lap, after the jump.

In an interview with C-SPAN, Justice Antonin Scalia once again graced us with his worldview. As usual, it is as beautiful and terrible as the dawn.

The WSJ Law Blog sloughed through the interview transcripts and pulled out this gleaming diamond of truth:

I mean there’d be a, you know, a defense or public defender from Podunk, you know, and this woman is really brilliant, you know. Why isn’t she out inventing the automobile or, you know, doing something productive for this society?

I mean lawyers, after all, don’t produce anything. They enable other people to produce and to go on with their lives efficiently and in an atmosphere of freedom. That’s important, but it doesn’t put food on the table and there have to be other people who are doing that. And I worry that we are devoting too many of our very best minds to this enterprise.

I have never agreed with Justice Scalia more than I do at this very moment. I … I’ve … got something in my eye.

I move that LSAC must send this quote to anybody that applies to sit for the LSAT. I further move that anybody scoring an IQ above 139 who does not receive a federal circuit clerkship or better must forthwith abandon legal practice and be forced into labor on renewable energy, cancer treatments, or summer blockbuster screenplay editing. Do I have a second?

Scalia: ‘We Are Devoting Too Many of Our Best Minds to’ Lawyering [WSJ Law Blog]

Earlier: Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia Hates Acronyms, Loves Marisa Tomei

Those law students at Fordham University have a new tidbit to add to their dossier on SCOTUS Justice Antonin Scalia. He made an appearance last night at the Friendship Heights Village Center in Chevy Chase, Maryland, to talk about his book, “Making Your Case: The Art of Persuading Judges.”

Politico reports that he gave out some pieces of advice, namely:

• “Don’t beat a dead horse.”

• “Be brief. And when your time expires, shut up and sit down.”

• Avoid acronyms in brief writing and oral arguments.

• Lawyers should study a judge’s background and likes and dislikes before they appear in court. “At the very least, these details will humanize the judge before you, so that you will be arguing to a human being instead of a chair.”

That last bit of advice can be taken too far, of course. Nino was annoyed when he found out about Fordham Law’s background research on him earlier this year.

Justice Scalia was willing to add to the files, though, revealing his favorite legal movie. What is it?

On Monday, the Supreme Court ordered a federal trial judge to take a closer look at the murder case against Troy Anthony Davis, a Georgia death row inmate. The SCOTUS directed the district judge to “receive testimony and make findings of fact as to whether evidence that could have been obtained at the time of trial clearly establishes [Davis’] innocence.”

Justice Antonin Scalia, joined by Justice Clarence Thomas, dissented. Justice Scalia questioned the viability of Davis’s claim of actual innocence, then went one step further. Even if Davis might be “actually” innocent, he’s SOL:

This Court has never held that the Constitution forbids the execution of a convicted defendant who has had a full and fair trial but is later able to convince a habeas court that he is “actually” innocent.

This bold pronouncement caught the attention of Professor Alan Dershowitz, back at Justice Scalia’s alma mater, Harvard Law School. From “Scalia’s Catholic Betrayal,” over at The Daily Beast:

Let us be clear precisely what [Scalia’s dissent] means. If a defendant were convicted, after a constitutionally unflawed trial, of murdering his wife, and then came to the Supreme Court with his very much alive wife at his side, and sought a new trial based on newly discovered evidence (namely that his wife was alive), these two justices would tell him, in effect: “Look, your wife may be alive as a matter of fact, but as a matter of constitutional law, she’s dead, and as for you, Mr. Innocent Defendant, you’re dead, too, since there is no constitutional right not to be executed merely because you’re innocent.”

It would be shocking enough for any justice of the Supreme Court to issue such a truly outrageous opinion, but it is particularly indefensible for Justices Scalia and Thomas, both of whom claim to be practicing Catholics, bound by the teaching of their church, to do moral justice. Justice Scalia has famously written, in the May 2002 issue of the conservative journal First Things, that if the Constitution compelled him to do something that was absolutely prohibited by mandatory Catholic rules, he would have no choice but to resign from the Supreme Court.

So should Justice Scalia resign? The Dersh isn’t saying that — yet.

But he does have a challenge for Nino.

* It sounds like very few protesters greeted John Yoo at Berkeley Law School. Only four were tenacious enough to get arrested. [Associated Press]

* Fen-phen lawyers sentenced to 20 and 25 years, respectively. The judge wants their sentences to deter other lawyers tempted to steal from settlement funds. [Bloomberg]

* Proskauer Rose probably likes this headline. [New York Daily News]

* Nino leads one to believe that empathy is not an important quality in a judge. [New York Times via Daily Beast]

* The 5th Circuit agrees with a Texas school district that has banned “shirts with words.” Are shirts with numbers okay? [Courthouse News Service]

* Michael Jackson’s children have lawyered up. [CNN]

* Nationwide salary cut watch: LA County judges. [Los Angeles Times]

* Why has there been no litigation surge in the recession? [National Law Journal]

Rejoice, wedding fans! We have some compelling mid-summer material for you this week: Wachtell, SCOTUS, lesbians, French nobility — read on for the details on all of that and more, as reported in the New York Times and filtered by us.

Our finalist couples:

1. Rebecca Gutner and Rodman Forter Jr.

2. Laura Hammond and Christopher Hemphill

3. Laure de Vulpillières and Vanessa Dillen

Admire these couples’ achievements, after the jump.

For those of you just tuning in, we have a little bit of a back and forth going on between Fordham Law School and One First Street. Last week, we wrote about What Fordham Knows About Justice Scalia. Professor Joel Reidenberg, an information privacy law professor at Fordham, had his class compile a 15-page dossier on Justice Antonin Scalia after the Justice was quoted in January saying, “Every single datum about my life is private? That’s silly.”

Dan Solove expounds on Scalia’s privacy views at Concurring Opinions:

[Scalia] believes that certain kinds of information are not private — Internet tracking, most items of consumption (unless embarrassing), addresses, and so on. He partly seems to endorse the view that there’s no privacy violation if there’s “nothing to hide.”

We checked in with Justice Scalia to see how he felt about Professor Reidenberg acting on his professed privacy beliefs. He was not pleased:

I stand by my remark at the Institute of American and Talmudic Law conference that it is silly to think that every single datum about my life is private. I was referring, of course, to whether every single datum about my life deserves privacy protection in law.

It is not a rare phenomenon that what is legal may also be quite irresponsible. That appears in the First Amendment context all the time. What can be said often should not be said. Prof. Reidenberg’s exercise is an example of perfectly legal, abominably poor judgment. Since he was not teaching a course in judgment, I presume he felt no responsibility to display any.

Professor Reidenberg responds to Justice Scalia’s response, after the jump.

Last week, we wrote about the Fordham law professor who assigned his information privacy law class to compile a dossier on Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia.

The professor had chosen Scalia as the target for privacy invasion because of the Justice’s remarks at a January conference organized by the Institute of American and Talmudic Law. Scalia’s views on the privacy of personal information online are summed up nicely by this quote:

“Every single datum about my life is private? That’s silly,” Scalia [said].

(And his views are summed up at greater length here by privacy expert and GW Law Professor Dan Solove.)

Professor Joel Reidenberg and his class now have a 15-page dossier on Scalia, including his home address, the value of his home, his home phone number, the movies he likes, his food preferences, his wife’s personal e-mail address, and “photos of his lovely grandchildren.”

We checked in with the Justice to see how he felt about his online information being aggregated and mined by the professor and his 15 students.

Scalia was far from pleased (though we were pleased that a Supreme Court Justice would honor Above The Law with a response). Check out his reply to us, after the jump.

Back in January, Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia was a speaker at the Institute of American and Talmudic Law’s midwinter conference on privacy issues. Sitting in the New York office of Weil Gotshal, Scalia told attendees that privacy was not that important to him.

From the Associated Press (available cached only):

Discussions of privacy rights in the digital era should distinguish between such confidential data as medical records and information that might be personal but is easy to find out, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia said Wednesday.

Considering every fact about someone’s life private is “extraordinary,” he said, noting that data such as addresses have long been discernible, even if technology has made them easier to find.

“Every single datum about my life is private? That’s silly,” Scalia [said].

Well, Fordham Law Professor Joel Reidenberg interpreted that as a challenge. He gave the fifteen students in his Information Privacy Law class a special assignment this semester: Track down everything available on the Web about Antonin Scalia to compile a dossier on him.

Find out what they found out, after the jump.

* United Airlines settled a suit filed by a former pilot, who resigned after repeatedly finding porn in hidden places in her cockpit, including underneath a cap on a safety device called a “stick shaker” (no pun intended). Click to see United’s ridiculous effort to dismiss. [The Seattle Times]

* Attorney General Andrew Cuomo convinced 9 out of the top 10 bonus recipients at AIG to return their bonuses. Who is number 10? [The New York Times]

* Barney Frank called Antonin Scalia a “homophobe.” [The Associated Press]

* It turns out that Madoff has more than $1 billion worth of assets and the french authorities plan to seize his chateau in Cap d’Antibe, France, so maybe his victims can get a time share? No? [The Associated Press]

* A court battle between billionaire Wilbur Ross and hedge fund manager Bruce Rose may be the key to understanding the housing crisis. [Bloomberg]

* A sex-discrimination suit against Wal-Mart reaches the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals today. 200 female employees say women in comparable jobs don’t get paid as much as men. [The Huffington Post]

* Preservationists think a landmark case in Chicago is cause for alarm. [The New York Times]

* Change you can believe in? It looks like Obama has recruited a few “washington insiders”: 8 of the 10 top lawyers he has hired for his transition team are veterans of the Clinton administration. [Bloomberg.com]

* After his hunt yesterday, Justice Antonin Scalia told a room full of big-time Texas lawyers that he disagreed with judges who used foreign law to interpret the constitution. [Houston Chronicle]

* “Protesters galvanized by a dragging death that has stirred memories of the notorious James Byrd case rallied twice outside an eastern Texas courthouse to speak out against a judicial system they consider racist.” [Associated Press]

* Are you ready for your close-up Mr. Rehnquist? The Hoover institution released files documenting Rehnquist’s first three years on the Court, years filled with land-mark cases like Roe v. Wade and United States vs. Nixon. [New York Times]

* California Attorney general is pushing the Supreme Court to decide the legality of Prop. 8. The Court could begin to act as soon as Wednesday, when they have their weekly conference. [San Jose Mercury News]

* Say it ain’t so! Washington regulators have finally opened up the doors on Belgian-based beer company InBev’s acquisition of Anheuser Busch, which monopolizes
50% of the US beer market. The merger will make InBev the largest beer company in the world. [Courthouse News Service]

* Sorry Ohio…President-elect Obama is probably going to wait a while before overhauling NAFTA. [Bloomberg.com]

Some of you may recall our coverage (here and here) of Justice Antonin Scalia’s recent talk to promote his new book, Making Your Case: The Art of Persuading Judges. The event took place here in Washington, D.C., in early June. As you can tell from our write-ups, we enjoyed the evening greatly (and will always treasure our signed copy of Justice Scalia’s book).

But not everyone left a happy camper. We received a heartfelt letter from an ATL correspondent whom we shall refer to only as “Nino Fanboy.” He sent the following letter to Justice Scalia, on the day following the event. We received a copy more recently. It begins:

Dear Justice Scalia:

I attended your book signing [on June 3rd] sponsored by the Federalist Society. For years now I’ve been a fond fan of yours. I would even call you my intellectual hero. I’ve always admired your charm and wit. But last night my image of you turned sour.

Several years ago I purchased a copy of A Matter of Interpretation [Justice Scalia’s 1997 book]. It has been a source of inspiration to me. I consider myself an ardent defender of Originalism. I attend the Catholic University, Columbus School of Law, and have engaged in several debates with classmates on the proper role of the courts and the best method of interpretation.

I bought a copy of A Matter of Interpretation (from which you received royalties) in the hopes that one day I would meet you and you would sign it. Last night I thought I’d found my opportunity. But I was waived [sic] away by you like a servant to a “philosopher king.”

Read the rest of Nino Fanboy’s strangely moving letter — this is just the tip of the proverbial iceberg — after the jump.

We aim for maximum accuracy around here, even as to trivial matters. So we bring you this correction to yesterday’s post, about Justice Antonin Scalia’s recent chance encounter with the Sex and the City star, Sarah Jessica Parker.

From Tony Mauro, writing at the BLT:

According to [an item in New York magazine], Scalia rushed over to the “Sex and the City” star and gushed about how he loves her show and could not wait to see the movie version, which debuted recently. And then, the magazine reported, Scalia bummed a cigarette from the star. The item also said a Court spokeswoman confirmed the meeting.

The version from inside the Court, corroborated by a source in New York who witnessed the encounter and wants to remain nameless, is quite different. Court spokeswoman Kathy Arberg says she did confirm the meeting, but not the details that the magazine offered. In reality, Arberg said, Justice Scalia did not need a cigarette. But when Parker asked for a light for hers, he provided it (as any Old World-style gentleman like Scalia would, we might add).

No offense to Parker, but Arberg also confirms that when the two first met on the sidewalk, Scalia did not know who Parker was. After introductions, Scalia realized her identity, but Arberg said, “Her work did not come up in the conversation.” In other words, the justice did not gush.

Does this version make Justice Scalia look better, or worse? On the one hand, removal of the judicial “gushing” makes Nino appear more dignified (and he’s all about upholding the dignity of the courts, which is why he abhors contractions in legal writing).

On the other hand, it’s a trifle embarrassing that Justice Scalia didn’t immediately recognize SJP. Maybe he needs to get out more? And speaking to the Federalist Society doesn’t count.

The Truth About Justice Scalia and Sarah Jessica Parker [The BLT: Blog of the Legal Times]

Earlier: The Eyes of the Law: Scalia, J., Hearting Sex and the City

At his talk last week before the Federalist Society here in Washington, Justice Antonin Scalia casually alluded to interviewing a clerkship applicant “just the other day.” One could sense the ears of hundreds of summer associates perking up at his passing mention of that coveted clerkship.

Justice Scalia’s offhand remark confirmed what we’ve been hearing through the grapevine. Nino has started interviewing potential law clerks for October Term 2009 — and he’s started hiring, too. We’ve confirmed that he has hired Katherine Twomey, a 2008 graduate of UVA Law School, who will be clerking for Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson (4th Cir.) before heading off to One First Street.

Is Justice Scalia moving early? Not terribly. It’s true, of course, that the OT 2009 crop of clerks won’t start for over a year. The Court is still busy handing down its biggest opinions for October Term 2007, and the October Term 2008 clerks have not yet arrived. (We have a short piece about the composition of the OT 2008 clerk class in this month’s Washingtonian magazine; to read it, click here.)

But compared to his colleagues, Justice Scalia is in the middle of the pack when it comes to OT 2009 hiring. In addition to Scalia, five other justices have hired at least one clerk for 2009-2010. Justice Ginsburg is the farthest along, having already hired half of her clerks for that year.

To see what the class of SCOTUS clerks for OT 2009 looks like so far, read below the fold.

We wouldn’t have guessed this, in light of his social conservatism and the show’s risqué nature. But here it is, from New York Magazine’s Intelligencer:

Apparently Antonin Scalia is a Sex and the City fan. When Sarah Jessica Parker finished an interview with Charlie Rose on May 29, she left the Bloomberg Building, where the show is taped, and stopped for a cigarette in the courtyard. The conservative Supreme Court justice emerged from a nearby Town Car and rushed over to praise the star.

“He was absolutely gushing, telling her how much he loved her show and how excited he was to see the movie,” says a witness. “Finally, he asked her if he could bum a cigarette.” She obliged, the witness said, and then Scalia strolled away. A Supreme Court spokeswoman confirmed the meeting but denied the cadge. “He was there for a symposium,” she said. “And he lent her a match.”

What, no lighter? Supreme Court justices may be underpaid, but Justice Scalia, who recently reported assets between $1.5 million and $3 million, can surely afford a nice Dunhill.

On second thought, maybe chemistry between SJP and AS isn’t so surprising after all. Justice Scalia does look a little like “Mr. Big.” (Or, to put it another way, Chris Noth looks like a young Scalia.)

Over at the WSJ Law Blog, a commenter speculates: “That is a new low, a guy telling a woman how much he likes ‘Sex and the City’ in order to bum a cigarette from her. How many guys really like that HBO series? Not very many. Scalia must be a hard core nicotine addict.”

Update / Correction: This post is subject to a correction. Please see here.

Love Supreme for Carrie Bradshaw [Intelligencer / NYM via WSJ Law Blog]

On Tuesday night we attended an excellent event here in Washington. Sponsored by the Federalist Society and titled An Evening with Justice Antonin Scalia, the event consisted of a talk by the justice about his new book, Making Your Case: The Art of Persuading Judges, followed by a question-and-answer session and book signing.

The first part of our write-up, focused on the book talk, was previously posted here. The second and final part, focused on the Q-and-A, appears after the jump.

On Tuesday evening, we attended An Evening with Justice Antonin Scalia, sponsored by the Washington, DC Lawyers Chapter of the Federalist Society. Justice Scalia spoke about his new book, Making Your Case: The Art of Persuading Judges; took questions on a wide range of subjects, during an impressively long Q-and-A session; and signed copies of his book for the adoring masses.

The event took place in a packed ballroom — standing room only — at the Marriott Wardman Park. If you’re interested, you can read a more detailed write-up, after the jump.

Justice Antonin Scalia is often wrongly viewed as being a knee-jerk conservative. If you survey his entire jurisprudence, you’ll notice many cases in which he sided with the criminal defendant over law enforcement. His view of the Sixth Amendment, as articulated in the line of sentencing cases starting with Apprendi and moving forward, is generally pro-defendant.

And just the other day, in Begay v. United States (PDF), Justice Scalia once again sided with the criminal. Why? An observant ATL reader offers this speculation:

In Begay v. U.S., the Court decided drunk driving was not a “violent felony” under the Armed Career Criminal Act. Nino concurred, saying the following: “because I cannot say that drunk driving clearly poses [a serious risk of injury to another], the rule of lenity brings me to concur in the judgment of the Court.”

Weird for two reasons. First, does Nino really think a DUI is not dangerous? And second, how often do we hear Nino invoke the rule of lenity?

But maybe not so weird after all. Recall Nino’s daughter, Ann Banaszewski, getting busted for DUI, which was all the more shocking because she had her kids in the car. Hmm.

In other recent Nino news, a different reader reports:

Did you read Scalia’s concurrence in Baze v. Rees? He pretty much gave Stevens a rhetorical beatdown; guess Nino won’t be getting an invite to Stevens’ birthday party this weekend….

Here’s one part we especially liked (citations omitted):

The experience of the state legislatures and the Congress—who retain the death penalty as a form of punishment—is dismissed as “the product of habit and inattention rather than an acceptable deliberative process.” The experience of social scientists whose studies indicate that the death penalty deters crime is relegated to a footnote. The experience of fellow citizens who support the death penalty is described, with only the most thinly veiled condemnation, as stemming from a “thirst for vengeance.” It is Justice Stevens’ experience that reigns over all.

Or maybe Justice Kennedy’s. Ain’t judicial review grand?

(That’s just one excerpt; the opinion as a whole is quite the benchslap. Check it out in full over here.)

Court: Drunk driving not a violent felony [SCOTUSblog]
Begay v. United States [SCOTUSblog (PDF)]

* House Democrats oppose Senate spy bill’s telecom immunity. [Washington Post]

* Justice Scalia approves of “so-called torture” under some circumstances. [MSNBC]

* Just a few months later, Senate committee gets around to admonishing Sen. Craig. [CNN]

* Clemens and McNamee go head to head before Congress. [ESPN]

* City’s scantily clad cowboy sues candy-coated counterpart. [WSJ Law Blog]

Our latest legal celebrity sighting: Justice Antonin Scalia, spotted at Georgetown University Law Center. He is believed to have been at GULC to speak to a con law class.

Of the current justices on the Supreme Court, Justice Scalia clearly inspires the greatest amount of fanatical devotion. How many other justices have their own fansite?

(Okay, Justice Thomas has one too. And with his new, bestselling memoir, My Grandfather’s Son, he’s definitely building a fan base. But we still think that Justice Scalia has the most groupies of any member of the SCOTUS.)

And how many other justices are asked to sign students’ laptop computers? This student, who had his laptop autographed by AS, was proudly displaying his computer to his classmates, saying that he felt Scalia had “blessed” his laptop for the upcoming exams.

With such a large and devoted following, we have a feeling that Justice Scalia’s forthcoming book — Making Your Case: The Art of Persuading Judges, a guide to persuasive legal writing and oral advocacy, which he’s writing together with legendary legal writing teacher Bryan Garner — will sell pretty well too.

Scalia to Join Supreme Court Book Club [Legal Times]