Clarence Thomas Asks First Question from Supreme Court Bench in 10 Years | Hacker News Reader

Clarence Thomas Asks First Question from Supreme Court Bench in 10 Years

npr.org

35 pointsmorninj14 comments

HN seems to be gravitating away from the guidelines (maybe it's the pull of the election season?) What do you think? Personally, I'm not a big fan of political stories on HN unless they concern technology. I feel like I'm already drowning in political news and opinion.

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"some interesting new phenomenon" ;)

Ha! Well, I stand corrected. :D

Actually, it's a good question. And I'm a anti-platelets liberal.

"He noted that the law allows someone convicted of a misdemeanor assault charge to get a lifetime ban on possessing a gun 'which at least as of now results in suspension of a constitutional right.' "

These days the right lawyer can turn a simple accident into a misdemeanor assault.

It was a good question.

It is a sound, relevant question. So would many others he (presumably) could have asked over the past decade.

Also, what is "anti-platelets"?

Oh dear, someone can't just copy off Scalia's work anymore.

Have you ever read anything he's written while on the court?

It is nonetheless interesting that shortly after Scalia's death Thomas starts asking questions after a ten year silence.

It would certainly seem to indicate he feels Scalia covered his questions in the past.

"correlation does not imply causation, but it does waggle its eyebrows suggestively and gesture furtively while mouthing 'look over there' "[1]

[1] https://xkcd.com/552/

If you can find a majority opinion he's written, it's likely to consist heavily of other people's words, albeit not necessarily Scalia's: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/28/us/justice-clarence-thomas...

While Scalia was an excellent writer (yet, not quite as clear as Richard Posner or Alex Kozinski), I think it's unfair to dismiss Thomas.

Personally, I found his dissent in Gonzales v. Raich quite interesting and principled: https://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/03-1454.ZD1.html

Thomas' Concurrence in McDonald vs. Chicago is also very interesting, as it takes a very different approach to 14th amendment incorporation -- in a relatively unique situation where a judge had to incorporate a BoR amendment that has not been incorporated against the state/local government before -- from the approach that used in nearly all the major civil rights/liberties related decisions over the last 75 years:

https://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/08-1521.ZC1.html

Personally, I find the cases where he disagrees with Scalia, or concurs with an Alito/Scalia majority opinion to be quite illuminating.

I wouldn't dismiss him, no. But everything is relative, and personally I find his opinions to be pedestrian compared to his other conservative colleagues. Judging by the relative infrequency of his majority opinions, I gather they feel similarly.

> Have you ever read anything his law clerks wrote for him while on the court?

(fixed)

Or maybe Scalia just asked all the right questions, that Clarence already had.

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