RBG HARSHING OUR MELLOW | WaPo Calls Judicial Elections A Serious Flaw | NYT Says HRC Needs To Get Real About Campaign Finance Reform
October 17, 2016
HARSHING MY MELLOW
|Friday, Supreme Court JUSTICE RUTH BADER GINSBURG apologized for her comments that were critical of COLIN KAEPERNICK refusing to stand for the national anthem at his games. In a statement released by the high court’s public information officer, RBG said she had been “barely aware of the incident or its purpose” and that she was “inappropriately dismissive and harsh.”
QUICK TO FORGIVE
|In The Washington Post, Jonathan Adler response to RBG’S apology, and notes that her most recent comments were not inappropriate from a judicial ethics standpoint. He writes, “Apparently it’s not enough for a Supreme Court justice to defend the right of individuals to protest injustice. In order to remain a progressive icon, one must also endorse the substance and methods of the protest at issue.”
WHY IT MATTERS
|From The Associated Press, the latest in its series on the presidential election takes a look at where the candidates stand on the issue of abortion. And you can take a wild guess as to why this issue might be of special importance this cycle. As AP puts it, “The prime battleground over abortion is the Supreme Court.”
ED BOARD OVERTURE
|The Editorial Board of The Washington Post is here to tell us “how not to pick a Supreme Court justice,” calling judicial elections a “flaw of the country’s criminal justice system” and referring to DONALD TRUMP’S public shortlist of SCOTUS nominees as setting a “terrible precedent.”
ED BOARD OVERTURE 2.0
|Over at The New York Times, their Editorial Board had this to say about “mega-donors” and campaign finance reform: “MRS. CLINTON has promised to pursue her campaign finance agenda from her first weeks in office. She would do well to focus on building support for it now. Beyond her strong proposals, she should be working to elect the congressional candidates she needs to enact true reform, no easy task in a Congress deeply beholden to mega-donors.”
TAKING A TOLL
|“More than 90 vacancies in the federal judiciary are taking a toll on judges, the courts and Americans seeking recourse. Obama has nominated replacements for more than half of those spots, including 44 nominees for the district court and seven for the appeals court. Yet the Senate has confirmed only nine district and appeals court judges this year — and only four since SCALIA died.” AP’s Mary Clare Jalonick reports.
ON DECK
|For The New York Times, Adam Liptak previews a SCOTUS case involving the killing of a fifteen-year-old boy. He was shot in the head from about 60 feet away by a U.S. Border Patrol agent, and now justices will have to decide whether the boy’s parents can sue the agent for violating the Constitution for using excessive force.
DEATH TO THE PENALTY
|On Friday, Florida’s Supreme Court declared the state’s death penalty law — which allows someone to be put to death without unanimity from a jury — to be unconstitutional. This marks the second time this year that a court has struck down the state’s death-sentencing statute; the first being when the Supreme Court found the state’s old law to be unconstitutional because it allowed judges, not juries, to make the final decision about imposing capital sentences. Friday’s ruling has potential implications for ongoing prosecutions and for the 385 inmates sitting on death row.
YOU KNOW VERY WELL WHO YOU ARE
|NYT’s Gregory Cowles gives us the story behind last week’s best sellers, with his top nod going to JUSTICE RUTH BADER GINSBURG and her new anthology, “My Own Words.” He recalls an interview RBG had earlier this month in which she reflected on her famous nickname and said, “When I was aked about it, I said, well, it’s exactly right, because NOTORIOUS B.I.G. and I had something in common…We were both born and bred in Brooklyn.”
OTHER NEWS
Jim Obergefell, Same-Sex Marriage Plaintiff, to Be Honored
The Associated Press“The lead plaintiff in the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that led to the legalization of same-sex marriage across the country is being honored with an award given to those that better their communities.”
How a Hillary Clinton Presidency Would Affect the Supreme Court
The Atlantic“Should the fate of the Supreme Court cause conservatives to support Donald Trump? That’s the message touted by a number of commentators on the right, who insist that judicial appointments are the stakes that matter most in the 2016 election.”