He make it all go away with one simple q&a at the hearings, and I'd tend to think odds are that's what will happen.
But if he wants to maintain that stance, then it becomes rather unpredictable (although it seems unlikely he'd be able to hold to that and be confirmed, I'd think; but this is now, and that will be then).
The interesting thing is that he didn't say he'd recuse himself if the case was strongly affected by his beliefs -- that is, if one of the options were against Catholic doctrine. He only said he'd recuse himself if the law required him to decide against Catholic doctrine. So if he thinks, to pick a completely random example, that there is no constitional right to abortion, no recusal because the law and his conscience are aligned. It's only if he thinks there is a right to abortion that he has to recuse himself.
I understand he was on the steering commitee of a Wash D.C. pharmacists organization.
I get the feeling the Powerline guys have a few pairs of plaid pants in the back of their closets, IYKWIM.
Please tell me that was a joke, Lizard Breath. It was playing off of his service on a Federalist Society steering committee, right? I think I've lost my sense of humor.
Try to think back to the last place you used it. That usually helps.
It was meant to be a joke. I don't in any way purport to claim that it was, in fact, funny.
FWIW, this story is running on the pfli.org website.
For non-clickers, PFLI = "Pharmacists for Life International," is quoting Paul Weyrich as comparing Roberts to Souter and lobbying for someone with more of a record.
Weyrich is the Jews killed Jesus guy, if you want another reason to hate Pharmacists for Life. (Some people soon forget their grudges against pharmacists, but I hate them for life! Sorry.) So I don't think it's too reassuring that Roberts is to his left.
LB, I only meant that the world has gotten so bizarre that it seems entirely possible to me that he could have been on a pharmacist board affiliated wuth Feminists for Life. I can't separate satire from reality anymore. There's only irony left.
I don't think this will pan out. It's just too obviously the wrong thing to say; Roberts is more than smart enough to know that that's a poison pill of a position for him to take. My bet is that either he didn't say it at all, or more likely he didn't say it in the way it was reported.
Look elsewhere (e.g., Turd blossom) for the real scandals.
I don't think you can actually hold this sort of position without also being batshit crazy in public, a la Roy Moore.
What TedL said (although I can also see it as a thoughtless comment that he's going to back away from as thoroughly as possible). He can't possibly have meant to take that as a serious position and still make it through the Senate.
Well, here's a subtlety.
Hypothetical:
Texas mandates the death penalty for certain offenses (murder motivated by racial animus, mebbe). Subsequently, a judge in Texas who has moral/religious objections to the death penalty refuses to work these cases. This seems to me not a terrible middle ground. Does everyone else regard this as an insupportable position?
As Oliver Wendell Holmes said:
"when I sit on a Court that reviews and affirms capital convictions, I am part of "the machinery of death." My vote, when joined with at least four others, is, in most cases, the last step that permits an execution to proceed. I could not take part in that process if I believed what was being done to be immoral."
I'd think the fear is the one LB adverted to in #2: the law allows two different interpretation, one conflicts with his religion - does religion become his decider?
9: it was. Not fall out of one's chair funny, but amusingly so.
"Does everyone else regard this as an insupportable position?"
No, but William Rehnquist does, as noted in my post.
The problem is that if Roberts were to simply recuse himself with any frequency, he goes against the SCOTUS doctrine that one should only recuse on that Court in the most extreme and unforgiving circumstances. Matters of conscience are certainly not common; has, in fact, any SCOTUS Justice ever recused on the basis of conscience, not financial conflict? Certainly no one has made a practice of it.
I continue to assume that the most likely case is that Roberts can dispose of this issue with a single answer at his hearings. But it's surprising that Turley claims Roberts were nonplussed by the question; of course, I heard it from him, who heard it from someone else, so we're also playing the game of Telephone here.
I hereby grant permission for people to address me by my first name, so long as they do so politely, by the way.
You may also touch my hem. We must be kind to the little people. Simply be sure to keep bowing as you back out of my presence.