Guys like Antonin Scalia have a reputation as being very small-c conservative and capital-R Republican. Their defenders, at least one of whom frequents my comments section (there's a clue that narrows it down to, um, one person) claim that this is a mischaracterization, and that Scalia merely favours a textual approach to statutory interpretation that happens to often align with Republican positions (since the Republicans are, on balance, the more likely of the two major parties to be stuck in the eighteenth century).
This seems like a good litmus test.
(To be clear, I don't personally know the first damned thing about American constitutional law, so I'm just taking this professor's interpretation at face value. I suspect there are also plenty of legal experts arguing the opposite side, although it's interesting that the one quoted in the article seems to take a decidedly unoriginalist approach.)
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2 comments:
It will probably take a few years for it to reach the Supreme Court and see a vote by Scalia. And by then Obama will have been elected president and the case will have been thrown out for lack of relevance.
As well, I'm not sure a litmus test is a good way of assessing a justice's ideology. I think one needs to look at a large body of work to discern themes. However, I definitely agree that this case would be an important once to include in any such body of work when assessing Scalia's textualism adherence.
- Mustafa Hirji
Take US Constitutional Law with Mathen in 3rd year. It's widely regarded as one of the most interesting courses offered at school.
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