It's a political cliche at this point to joke about moving to another country if a certain presidential candidate doesn't win. Gobs of Americans were headed to Canada if George W. Bush was reelected in 2004. A similar contingent threatened to flood across our northern border when Barack Obama was elected and reelected.

Generally, though, you don't hear a Supreme Court justice talking like this. In fact, you generally don't hear a Supreme Court justice talking at all — much less about the big political issues of the day.

Most justices aren't Ruth Bader Ginsburg, though. And in a new New York Times interview, Ginsburg doesn't hold a thing back when it comes to the 2016 election.

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Ginsburg is known for pushing the bounds of a justice's public comments and has earned something of a cult following on the left. But some say she just went too far.

"I find it baffling actually that she says these things," said Arthur Hellman, a law professor at the University of Pittsburgh. "She must know that she shouldn’t be. However tempted she might be, she shouldn’t be doing it."

Similarly, Howard Wolfson, a former top aide to Hillary Clinton and former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg, said Ginsburg shouldn't have said it.

snip

Jeff Greenfield @greenfield64
2/2 If there's a redo of Bush v. Gore, how does Ginsburg not recuse herself, given her Trump comments?


And that's really a key reason justices don't talk like Ginsburg did. Sometimes they have to hear cases involving political issues and people. Having offered their unprompted opinions about such things can lead to questions about prejudice and potential recusal from future cases.

As Greenfield notes, Ginsburg was a part of the court that decided who the president was when the 2000 election was thrown to the Supreme Court, so this isn't uncharted territory. Had she said something similar about either Bush or Al Gore, would she have been able to hear the case?

Louis Virelli is a Stetson University law professor who just wrote a book on Supreme Court recusals, titled "Disqualifying the High Court." He said that "public comments like the ones that Justice Ginsburg made could be seen as grounds for her to recuse herself from cases involving a future Trump administration. I don't necessarily think she would be required to do that, and I certainly don't believe that she would in every instance, but it could invite challenges to her impartiality based on her public comments."

Hellman said Ginsburg's comments could muddy the waters when it comes to decisions not just involving Trump but also his policies — something that could come up regularly should he win the presidency.

"It would cast doubt on her impartiality in those decisions," Hellman said. "If she has expressed herself as opposing the election of Donald Trump, her vote to strike down a Trump policy would be under a cloud."

Ed Whelan, president of the Ethics and Public Policy Center and who once clerked for conservative Justice Antonin Scalia, has criticized Ginsburg before for her public comments. But he said this one is more indefensible than any of its predecessors.

"I think this exceeds the others in terms of her indiscretions," Whelan said. "I am not aware of any justice ever expressing views on the merits or demerits of a presidential candidate in the midst of the campaign. I am not a fan of Donald Trump's at all. But the soundness or unsoundness of her concerns about Donald Trump has no bearing on whether it was proper for her to say what she said."

Rick Hasen, a law professor at the University of California at Irvine, said it's valid to question how Ginsburg might have to handle a potential Trump case — up to and including a Clinton v. Trump case.

"I think this is ultimately a question for judicial ethicists, but I do think following these comments it is a legitimate question to raise, should Donald Trump’s campaign come to the Court with any legal questions before the election," Hasen wrote on his blog.

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https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-...important-line/


"Casting doubt on Ginsberg's impartiality"
And just what impartiality is Hellman talking about???? that's gotta be a joke!

This article must've been written by someone at 'The Onion'. that's all I can figure... TM

Another look at the same story....


The editorial boards for both the New York Times and the Washington Post took issue with Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s recent musings about presumptive Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump.

Each paper editorialized this week that Supreme Court justices should hold back from broadcasting their preferences in the presidential race because it could question their impartiality.

Neither the Times nor the Post challenged Ginsburg’s assessment of Trump as egotistical, inconsistent and unqualified for the Oval Office. Nevertheless, her comments would have been better left unspoken, according to the newspapers.

“As journalists, we generally favor more openness and disclosure from public figures rather than less,” the Post wrote on Tuesday. “Yet Justice Ginsburg’s off-the-cuff remarks about the campaign fall into that limited category of candor that we can’t admire, because it’s inconsistent with her function in our democratic system.”

On Wednesday, the Times characterized Ginsburg’s comments as “political punditry” and “name-calling.”

“There is no legal requirement that Supreme Court justices refrain from commenting on a presidential campaign. But Justice Ginsburg’s comments show why their tradition has been to keep silent,” the paper opined.

Both papers invoked the Supreme Court’s role in resolving the contested 2000 presidential election between Republican George W. Bush and Democrat Al Gore. At the time, many liberals criticized the decision, which was backed by five conservative justices, as partisan.

“Think of how that situation would have played out,” the Post suggested, “if one or more of the justices had previously mused about leaving for New Zealand in the event of a victory for either Mr. Bush or his opponent, Democrat Al Gore.”

Similarly, the Times wrote, “And just imagine if this were 2000 and the resolution of the election depended on a Supreme Court decision. Could anyone now argue with a straight face that Justice Ginsburg’s only guide would be the law?”

Ginsburg sparked the controversy with a pair of Friday interviews with the Times and the Associated Press. She said presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton would likely win the November election and did not want to entertain the possibility of a President Trump.

“I don’t want to think about that possibility, but if it should be, then everything is up for grabs,” she told the AP.

Two days later, the Times published its Ginsburg interview, in which she offered even more pointed criticism. The left-leaning jurist said she couldn’t imagine what the United States would become with Trump as the president and joked that her husband, if he were still alive, might have suggested moving to New Zealand.

She also pointed out that the next president is likely to have a significant impact on the court. In addition to the seat left vacant by the death of Justice Antonin Scalia last February, Ginsburg and other justices are reaching an age in which they might retire

Ginsburg further called Trump a “faker” during a Monday interview with CNN: “He has no consistency about him. He says whatever comes into his head at the moment. He really has an ego.”’

Early Wednesday morning, Trump took to Twitter calling for Ginsburg’s resignation
Donald J. Trump ✔ @realDonaldTrump
Justice Ginsburg of the U.S. Supreme Court has embarrassed all by making very dumb political statements about me. Her mind is shot - resign!
12:54 AM - 13 Jul 2016


The Code of Conduct for United States Judges, which includes the ethical canons for federal judges, states that a judge should not “publicly endorse or oppose a candidate for public office.”

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said it was “totally inappropriate” for a member of the Supreme Court to weigh in on a U.S. election.

“It raises the level of skepticism that the American people have from time to time about just how objective this Supreme Court is,” McConnell said Tuesday.

But MSNBC liberal pundit Lawrence O’Donnell argued that Ginsburg did not cross the line by weighing in on the presidential race. He pointed out on his show, “The Last Word,” that three Supreme Court justices actually ran for president: Justice John McLean ran for the Republican nomination in 1856, Chief Justice Salmon Chase ran for the Democratic nomination in 1868 and 1872 and Justice Stephen Field ran for the Democratic nomination in both 1880 and 1884. Their primary campaigns were all unsuccessful.

Though the justices’ White House bids may show that there was not as strong of a separation between the Supreme Court and political campaigns in the 19th century, the high court has had a more impartial tradition in recent decades.


Lyle Denniston, the constitutional literacy adviser for the National Constitution Center, said that nothing in the Constitution’s guarantees of free speech prevents Supreme Court Justices from political commentary. He said their First Amendment rights might only be restricted if they say something that reveals their bias in deciding a lawsuit.

“But, whatever the ethical rules provide, most judges feel restrained about saying things that might suggest that they are trying to influence how voters react to politics or to candidates,” Denniston wrote on the National Constitution Center’s website. “This is not merely a matter of ‘political correctness.’ It has more to do with public sentiments about how judges and Justices should do their jobs while staying above the fevered turmoil of politics as it is sometimes practiced in America.”

https://www.yahoo.com/news/nyt-wapo-crit...-000000574.html
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Yeah, talk is cheap!

"Each paper editorialized this week that Supreme Court justices should hold back from broadcasting their preferences in the presidential race because it could question their impartiality."

translation: don't say anything that will divulge your deep partisanship. your vote will be needed so keep your mouth shut. don't say anything that will give evidence of your obvious bias.TM

Quote: Cincinnatus wrote in post #5

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Zitat

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U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on Thursday apologized for statements she made criticizing Republican presidential contender Donald Trump.

"On reflection, my recent remarks in response to press inquiries were ill-advised and I regret making them," she said in a statement issued by the court.

"Judges should avoid commenting on a candidate for public office. In the future I will be more circumspect," Ginsburg added.

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Goodie. Now resign you stupid cow.

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or better yet, just croak!