When was the last time you heard of a sitting Supreme Court Justice tossing out partisan political opinions about presidential candidates?
Ever?
If so, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has broken your schneid, and then some.
Ms. Ginsburg – who, based on other statements she has made in the past should not be on the Supreme Court or anywhere near it, decided it would be a great idea to name-call Donald Trump. Several times.
Here’s a sampling, drawn from a surprisingly critical editorial in today’s New York Times:
Three times in the past week, Justice Ginsburg has publicly discussed her view of the presidential race, in the sharpest terms. In an interview with The Times published Sunday, Justice Ginsburg said, “I can’t imagine what the country would be — with Donald Trump as our president,” joking that if her husband were alive, he might have said, “It’s time for us to move to New Zealand.”
Earlier, in an interview with The Associated Press that appeared on Friday, when asked to consider a Trump victory, Justice Ginsburg replied, “I don’t want to think about that possibility, but if it should be, then everything is up for grabs.”
Ms Ginsburg’s comments are not just unseemly and inappapropriate, they are unethical and unconscionable.
And it’s not like this is the first time Ruth Bader Ginsburg has made comments that should disqualify her from the Supreme Court bench.
Read the reaction of other justices to her suggestion that Supreme Court decisions should be influenced by foreign law, from Adam Liptak’s article in the New York Times of April 11, 2009:
“I frankly don’t understand all the brouhaha lately from Congress and even from some of my colleagues about referring to foreign law,” Justice Ginsburg said in her comments on Friday.
The court’s more conservative members — Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justices Samuel A. Alito Jr., Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas — oppose the citation of foreign law in constitutional cases.
“If we’re relying on a decision from a German judge about what our Constitution means, no president accountable to the people appointed that judge and no Senate accountable to the people confirmed that judge,” Chief Justice Roberts said at his confirmation hearing. “And yet he’s playing a role in shaping the law that binds the people in this country.”
Justice Ginsburg tried to walk her comment back, by claiming she didn’t actually mean foreign law should be incorporated into Supreme Court decisions….but her walk-back lacked a certain attribute which would have helped it: credibility.
Donald Trump is demanding that Ms. Ginsburg resign over her comments about him. And he is correct. She should resign. But she won’t.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s age and physical health (she is 83 and has cancer) will probably abbreviate her future longevity on the court.
On a personal level, I wish her many more years of cancer-free health.
But, judicially, the sooner she resigns, regardless of reasons, the better.
Until then, my message is very simple: Dear Ms. Ginsburg: please shut up.
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UPDATE: With a major tip of my imaginary hat to Steven Hayward at powerlineblog.com:
Canon 5 of the Code of Conduct for United States Judges:
Canon 5: A Judge Should Refrain from Political Activity
(A) General Prohibitions. A judge should not:
(1) act as a leader or hold any office in a political organization;
(2) make speeches for a political organization or candidate, or publicly endorse or oppose a candidate for public office.
I therefore repeat: Dear Ms. Ginsburg: please shut up.
Should this make her recuse herself on cases against the government if Trump is elected???