David Souter

Morning Docket 5.05.09

By

other bike.jpg* The bankruptcy judge has made several decisions to keep Chrysler afloat including allowing a $4.5 billion credit line from the U.S. and Canadian governments. [The Detroit Free Press]
* State attorneys general will meet with Craiglist to discuss the elimination of advertisements for “illegal sexual activities.” [The Associated Press]
* In the Court’s first public appearance since Souter announced his retirement–there were many announcements of decisions and upcoming cases–but no mention of the elephant in the room. One case that will be decided is whether it is cruel and unusual punishment to give minors life sentences for serious crimes like rape. [The Washington Post]
* A group of biker lawyers has gotten together to form a small Los Angeles firm that represents victims of motorcycle accidents. [The Los Angeles Times]
* The story of a Beijing lawyer who took on Communist officials in court is evidence of how little freedom Chinese citizens really have. [The Los Angeles Times]

Sign up for the Above the Law newsletter

Subscribe to our free daily email and get breaking news, commentary, and opinions on law firms, lawyers, law schools, lawsuits, judges, and more.

ATL Poll: Who Should Replace SCOTUS Justice David Souter?

By

scotus small.jpgATL readers, there are many names being bandied about as potential nominees for the Supreme Court. We’ve narrowed the list to nine people who have been mentioned by at least two of the following outlets: BLT, AP, and the SCOTUSblog.

That the next Supreme Court justice will lack a Y chromosome is a virtual certainty, but we’ve thrown a few token males into the poll anyway. Who strikes your fancy?

More on these nine, after the jump.

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “ATL Poll: Who Should Replace SCOTUS Justice David Souter?”

Morning Docket 05.01.09

By

Thumbnail image for souter2.jpg* As we told you last night, Supreme Court Justice David Souter, a 1990 Bush appointee, plans to bid One First Street farewell in June. Last night, we pointed you to BLT’s speculation on possible nominees. Here’s speculation from the AP. [Associated Press]

* The Supreme Court experts at SCOTUSblog write with the most insight into Justice Souter’s decision to retire now and speculation on who Obama will nominate. Souter’s replacement “has to be a woman… Race and ethnicity seem less important” as considerations, says SCOTUSblog. [SCOTUSblog]

* Justice Souter is only 69. Why is he stepping down before he even needs a cane to get around the hallowed halls? Because he hates the nation’s capital. [CBS News]

* Will President Obama’s list of 13 million e-mail addresses help make the SCOTUS nomination process go smoothly? [Washington Post]

* More on the sad suicide of Kilpatrick Stockton layoff Mark Levy. [Washington Post]

Breaking: Justice Souter Retiring

By

Souter Obama Supreme.jpgAccording to NPR, Justice David Souter is planning to retire from the U.S. Supreme Court at the end of the current Term.

Souter is expected to remain on the bench until a successor has been chosen and confirmed, which may or may not be accomplished before the court reconvenes in October.

Arlen Specter’s switch from Republican to Democrat looms even larger now.

We’ve reached out to the SCOTUS public information officer, but have not yet received comment. (We’re not surprised, though, since we reached out at 10:25 p.m.)

Update (11:47 p.m.): The PIO got back to us:

Justice Souter has no comment.

If true, Souter’s retirement would do little to change the balance of the court. Remember:

An Obama pick would be unlikely to change the ideological makeup of the court. Souter, though appointed by the first President Bush, generally votes with the more liberal members of the court, a group of four that is in a rather consistent minority.

Souter’s retirement is not entirely surprising to regular Above the Law readers. Earlier this month, we — via Underneath Their Robes — told you that Souter hadn’t hired any clerks for the October 2009 term.

Let the jockeying begin for Obama’s first SCOTUS nomination. We invite you to suggest nominees in the comments. Maybe we’ll do a poll…

Update: The BLT has an early line on possible nominees, after the jump.

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Breaking: Justice Souter Retiring”

Liveblogging the Clarence Thomas Book Party

By

Clarence Thomas book My Grandfather's Son Above the Law blog.jpgWelcome. If you’re at home, tune in to C-SPAN, which is rebroadcasting the recent book party for Justice Clarence Thomas. Justice Thomas’s eagerly anticipated memoir, My Grandfather’s Son, is now in bookstores — and topping the bestseller charts (to the relief of his publisher, HarperCollins, which reportedly paid him a $1.5 million advance).
7:05: The party is being held at the elegant, red-brick Capitol Hill home of radio host and syndicated columnist Armstrong Williams. Expected to attend: 250 guests, including six Supreme Court justices, Vice President Dick Cheney, and several U.S. senators.
Armstrong Williams is interviewed. He explains that the party has been in the works since June. An overwhelming turnout is expected; more people were turned away than allowed to attend.
7:08: Justice Thomas climbs the stairs. When he enters the kitchen — which is right at the top of the stairs, and thus (oddly) where everyone enters and exits — he’s greeted by hearty applause.
Various guests hug him. One guest gushes over his 60 Minutes appearance. CT explains that CBS News made no promises about the nature of its coverage. Interesting. Considering how flattering that segment was, and how uncritical Steve Kroft was in his questioning of Justice Thomas, one might have suspected that Brangelina-type stipulations were in place.
More after the jump.

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Liveblogging the Clarence Thomas Book Party”

Bush v. Gore: Enough to Make a Grown Justice Cry?

By

David Souter cry weep sob David H Souter David Hackett Souter DHS Above the Law blog.jpgAnother day, another controversy involving New Yorker scribe Jeffrey Toobin and his eagerly anticipated book, The Nine: Inside the Secret World of the Supreme Court (to be published on September 18).
Yesterday we wrote about Toobin weighing in on who deserved the blame for Harriet Miers. Today we bring you a new drama (first noted earlier this week by Jeff Dufour and Patrick Gavin, over at Yeas & Nays).
We begin with a juicy excerpt from Toobin’s book, concerning Justice Souter’s reaction to Bush v. Gore:

David Souter alone was shattered. He was, fundamentally, a very different person from his colleagues. It wasn’t just that they had immediate families; their lives off the bench were entirely unlike his. They went to parties and conferences; they gave speeches; they mingled in Washington, where cynicism about everything, including the work of the Supreme Court, was universal.

More discussion, including JT’s juicy revelation about Justice Souter, after the jump.

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Bush v. Gore: Enough to Make a Grown Justice Cry?”

The Coolest Party E-vah: An E-vite for the E-lect

By

Whatcha doin’ for New Year’s? Unless your plans include the words “Diddy” and “yacht,” they’re not as fabulous as this fête:
tim wu evite supreme court clerks the elect.JPG

Some explanation is in order. This party is being brought to you by one of America’s brightest legal minds: celebrity law professor Tim Wu, of Columbia Law School. (We don’t know who this “Sue” character is.)

If you haven’t read ATL’s fawning past coverage of Professor Wu, here’s one detail that says it all: Richard Posner calls him “the Genius Wu.” Need we say more?

The invite list is equally spectacular. It includes these legal luminaries:

(1) Noah Feldman, the hottie-cum-public-intellectual that Harvard just lured away from NYU;

(2) Kermit Roosevelt, the hottie-cum-law-professor-cum-novelist (yes, descended from THOSE Roosevelts); and

(3) Tali Farhadian, the hottie-cum-hottie-cum-hottie.

Memorably described as a “lush Persian beauty,” Farhadian belongs on a Milan runway, a top-five law school faculty, or both.

All of these celebs — like their host, Tim Wu (Breyer/OT 1999) — are members of the Elect. Professors Feldman and Roosevelt clerked for Justice Souter (in October Terms 1998 and 1999, respectively). Farhadian clerked for Justice O’Connor (in October Term 2004).

But Feldman, Roosevelt and Farhadian, in all of their blinding brightness, might be eclipsed if a single invitee makes an appearance at the festivities.

Yes, that’s right. Also on “The List”: AQUAGIRL!!!

Allow us to paraphrase JFK’s famous words about Thomas Jefferson:

“I think this will be the most extraordinary collection of young legal celebrity and fabulosity that has ever been gathered together at a party — with the possible exception of when Aquagirl swam alone.”

Earlier: An Update on Aquagirl: Things Are Going Swimmingly
Wherein We Receive An Email from Celebrity Law Prof Tim Wu
Musical Chairs: Professor Noah Feldman Is Leaving NYU for Harvard!

Supreme Court Justice “Net Popularity Scores”

By

supreme court 2006.jpgYou may recall our recent Above the Law reader polls for Most Favorite Supreme Court Justice and Least Favorite Supreme Court Justice. The results of those polls are available here and here, respectively.
One of you had an interesting suggestion: Combine the results of the two polls to generate “net popularity scores” for the justices. These scores, combining measures of how much each justice is liked and disliked, could be viewed as measuring “overall” popularity.
We thought it would be interesting to see the results, so we went ahead and did this. We took the percentage of the vote each justice received in the “Most Favorite” poll, then subtracted from it the percentage of the vote received in the “Least Favorite” poll. We labeled the result the justice’s “Net Popularity Score” (NPS).
Here are the results of this number-crunching, with the justices ranked by NPS, from highest to lowest:
net popularity score 2.jpg
A few quick thoughts:
1. The rankings strike us as decent measures of overall popularity. Two of the top three finishers are favorites of their respective ideological wings. Justice Scalia, a cult figure among conservatives, comes in first; Justice Stevens, a hero of the liberals, places third.
2. The Chief is like Sara Lee: Nobody doesn’t like him. He got zero percent of the votes in the “Least Favorite” poll (just 24 votes out of 6,290). And, presumably due to his good looks and great resume — since he doesn’t have many opinions to be judged by yet — he won 16 percent of the “Most Favorite” vote. This gave him an NPS of 16, almost enough to beat Nino.
3. The next three justices — Justices Breyer, Thomas, and Alito — have net popularity scores close to zero. This makes sense too: as jurists, they don’t excite grand passion (even if Justice Thomas, prior to his confirmation, was a controversial figure).
4. Justice Alito, a fairly low-key personality, earns a “perfect” score of zero. Two percent of voters picked him as their favorite; two percent picked him as their least favorite. He’s like The Justice Who Wasn’t There (although, in fairness to Justice Alito, he’s too new to the bench to have made many enemies or fans).
5. Three justices have negative net popularity scores: Justices Kennedy, Souter, and Ginsburg. Their negative scores may have been affected by the fact that the voter pool in the “Least Favorite Justice” pool skewed to the right (thanks in large part to an Instapundit link).
6. As for why Justice Ginsburg attracted such a high percentage of the “least favorite” votes, Ann Althouse — and her commenters — have some interesting thoughts on the matter.
Earlier: ATL Poll Results: Your LEAST Favorite Supreme Court Justice
ATL Poll Results: Your Favorite Supreme Court Justice

ATL Poll Results: Your LEAST Favorite Supreme Court Justice

By

After finding out your Favorite Supreme Court Justice (answer: Justice Scalia), we asked about your LEAST Favorite Supreme Court justice. And the result was surprising, at least to us.
Voter turnout was massive, with over 6,000 votes cast. Maybe everyone’s in a voting frame of mind, with Election Day so close. Here’s how you voted:
least favorite supreme court justice poll results.JPG
The “winner”: Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, with a whopping 40 percent of ballots cast. Second place went to Justice David H. Souter, with 19 percent of the vote.
Thank you to the voters — all 6,000 of you. And thanks to everyone who linked to the poll, especially Glenn Reynolds, Ann Althouse, and Jason Harrow (of SCOTUSblog).
We have a few cursory observations on these results, which appear after the jump.

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “ATL Poll Results: Your LEAST Favorite Supreme Court Justice”

ATL Reader Poll: Your LEAST Favorite Supreme Court Justice

By

supreme court 2006.jpgNot much explanation required. This is just the flip-side of our recently concluded Favorite Supreme Court Justice poll (in which Justice Scalia easily prevailed).
Now we want to learn which of the Nine Robed Ones is your LEAST favorite jurist.
We’ll keep the polls open until we get at least 1,000 responses, so that the result can be viewed as a fairly reliable indicator of ATL reader sentiment. Here’s the poll:

Who is your LEAST favorite U.S. Supreme Court justice?
Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr.
Justice John Paul Stevens
Justice Antonin Scalia
Justice Anthony M. Kennedy
Justice David H. Souter
Justice Clarence Thomas
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg
Justice Stephen G. Breyer
Justice Samuel A. Alito, Jr.

  
Free polls from Pollhost.com


Please cast your vote, and spread the word to others who might be interested. Thanks!
Earlier: ATL Poll Results: Your Favorite Supreme Court Justice

ATL Poll Results: Your Favorite Supreme Court Justice

By

Last Friday, we asked you to vote for your Favorite Supreme Court Justice.
Over 1,300 votes were cast. Here are the results:
favorite supreme court justice poll results.JPG
Interesting! Thanks to everyone who participated in the poll. And thanks to SCOTUSblog and Professor Althouse for linking to the poll, which generated many votes.
Update: Vote for your LEAST favorite Supreme Court justice by clicking here.
Our random observations on the results, after the jump.

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “ATL Poll Results: Your Favorite Supreme Court Justice”

A Random Friday Poll: Your Favorite Supreme Court Justice

By

This is NOT an official ATL contest. We won’t offer any commentary on the candidates, to keep the proceedings objective. This is simply a random Friday poll that we’re conducting for our own curiosity.
Readers of this site are generally interested in, and highly knowledgeable about, the United States Supreme Court. Many of you might be called “legal nerds” or “judicial groupies” (both of which we view as badges of honor).
So while we have you all here, we thought we’d ask:
supreme court 2006.jpg

Who is your favorite U.S. Supreme Court justice?
Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr.
Justice John Paul Stevens
Justice Antonin Scalia
Justice Anthony M. Kennedy
Justice David H. Souter
Justice Clarence Thomas
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg
Justice Stephen G. Breyer
Justice Samuel A. Alito, Jr.

  
Free polls from Pollhost.com


We know that such online polls have been conducted previously. See, e.g., here. And we have seen articles in which legal experts are asked to name their favorite member of the SCOTUS. See, e.g., here.
But we haven’t seen such polls or articles for the Court as currently constituted, i.e., after the appointements of Chief Justice John Roberts and Associate Justice Samuel Alito. So we thought we’d run such a poll and see what results we get.
Please cast your vote, so this tally will be as accurate a representation of ATL reader opinion as possible. Thanks!