Justice Samuel Alito’s recent assertion that Congress lacks the authority to regulate the Supreme Court contradicts pledges made by him and other justices during their confirmation processes to adhere to congressional ethics laws. Investigations revealing failures to comply with federal gift laws, including Alito’s acceptance of a private jet flight before ruling on a related business matter, have fueled calls for Congress to impose a formal code of ethics on the Supreme Court.
I’m not sure. It’s partly just that Alito is a selfish, lonely, bitter, viciously bigoted person. The progressive justices don’t seem to be having a problem following the ethics rules.
I’m progressive as they come, but that’s not entirely true. While nowhere near as bad as any of the conservative justices, Sotomayor used her position of power to have her staff push book sales to libraries and schools, something that would be illegal for pretty much any other federal employee:
Sotomayor’s staff has often prodded public institutions that have hosted the justice to buy her memoir or children’s books, works that have earned her at least $3.7 million since she joined the court in 2009. Details of those events, largely out of public view, were obtained by The Associated Press through more than 100 open records requests to public institutions. The resulting tens of thousands of pages of documents offer a rare look at Sotomayor and her fellow justices beyond their official duties.
In her case, the documents reveal repeated examples of taxpayer-funded court staff performing tasks for the justice’s book ventures, which workers in other branches of government are barred from doing. But when it comes to promoting her literary career, Sotomayor is free to do what other government officials cannot because the Supreme Court does not have a formal code of conduct, leaving the nine justices to largely write and enforce their own rules.
Good comment! (Sorry, not on here a lot)
An important reminder and a good counter example. That said…this is petty and clearly unethical, and also strikes me as quite a different phenomenon from the kind of open corruption we are talking about with the conservative justices.
