SCOTUS

When Clarence Thomas and Sam Alito have taken "gifts" from very wealthy men who have had business before the court, and then Chief Justice Roberts resists implementing an enforceable code of ethics - that's when we know our Supreme Court is well on its way to becoming the kind of rubber stamp the Right Radicals want it to be.

Remember - this is a hostile takeover. The point of the exercise for "conservatives" is to strip down our government, sell off its assets, and reduce its function to 3 things:

1. Defend American commercial interests abroad
2. Keep the rabble in line here at home
3. Settle contract disputes among the ruling class

Elena Kagan Endorses High Court Ethics Enforcement Mechanism

Justice Elena Kagan proposed Chief Justice John Roberts appoint a panel of judges to enforce the US Supreme Court’s code of conduct.

While speaking Thursday at a judicial conference in Sacramento, California, Kagan said she trusts Roberts and if he creates “some sort of committee of highly respected judges with a great deal of experience and a reputation for fairness,” that seems like a good solution.

The court has been dogged by controversy following reports of lavish vacations, private jet flights, and other gifts received by Justice Clarence Thomas. The justices adopted a code of conduct for the first time in November in response to growing demands for transparency and accountability, but it’s been criticized for lacking an enforcement mechanism.

Kagan, in response to a moderator’s question at the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit’s annual judicial conference, acknowledged there are difficulties in deciding who should enforce an ethics code for the justices.

“But I feel as though we, however hard it is, that we could and should try to figure out some mechanism for doing this,” she said.

Separate Writings

During a discussion with lawyer Roger Townsend and US Bankruptcy Judge Madeleine Wanslee, Kagan also criticized her colleagues for writing multiple opinions in a single case, saying it complicates matters for lower courts.

“It prevents us, I think, from giving the kind of guidance that lower courts have a right to expect, that the public has a right to expect,” she said.

While there are times when separate writings make sense, Kagan said justices shouldn’t be writing separately just because they would have written the majority decision differently. The court should have a “higher threshold” than that, she said.

Kagan cited the court’s fractured decision in the United States v. Rahimi gun case. The court upheld a federal law that bans people subject to domestic violence restraining orders from possessing a gun in a 8-1 decision in which seven of the nine justices wrote their own opinions despite there being only one dissent.

The opinions signaled divisions among the justices on how to use history and tradition to analyze the constitutionality of firearm restrictions in the wake of the court’s 2022 decision in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association Inc. v. Bruen. In that case, the justices told lower courts to look at history and tradition when deciding what gun regulations are permissible.

Kagan’s comments follow a momentous Supreme Court term. The justices issued a string of controversial decisions that limited the power of federal regulators, eliminated a federal ban on a gun accessory used in America’s deadliest mass shooting, and gave former President Donald Trump immunity from criminal prosecution for some official acts while in office.

Townsend is a trial attorney with Breskin Johnson & Townsend in Seattle.