9-3-05
New Member of Supreme Court Brings More Than Just One Vote
Breaking NewsSupreme Court history is filled with testaments to the impact of personality and the significance of personal interaction. Prof. Sanford V. Levinson of the University of Texas School of Law has studied the career of Justice Felix Frankfurter, the indisputably brilliant Harvard Law School professor named to the court by President Franklin D. Roosevelt.
"Professor Frankfurter thought it was his role to socialize newcomers," Professor Levinson said, adding that Justice Frankfurter could be so condescending and overbearing, as in one instance when he sent Justice John Marshall Harlan a disapproving note with instructions to "read and reread" a particular essay on jurisprudence, "that he pushed away his natural friends and allies."
In similar fashion today, Justice Antonin Scalia, another former law professor with a tongue as sharp as his wit, has not fulfilled predictions that his intelligence and charm would make him a leader on the court. "Everybody expected Scalia to be able to charm his colleagues, and the biggest surprise of his tenure is that he has played William O. Douglas rather than William Brennan," Professor Levinson said, referring to one of the court's most famous curmudgeons and one of its most successful salesmen.
comments powered by Disqus
News
- The Debt Ceiling Law is now a Tool of Partisan Political Power; Abolish It
- Amitai Etzioni, Theorist of Communitarianism, Dies at 94
- Kagan, Sotomayor Join SCOTUS Cons in Sticking it to Unions
- New Evidence: Rehnquist Pretty Much OK with Plessy v. Ferguson
- Ohio Unions Link Academic Freedom and the Freedom to Strike
- First Round of Obama Administration Oral Histories Focus on Political Fault Lines and Policy Tradeoffs
- The Tulsa Race Massacre was an Attack on Black People; Rebuilding Policies were an Attack on Black Wealth
- British Universities are Researching Ties to Slavery. Conservative Alumni Say "Enough"
- Martha Hodes Reconstructs Her Memory of a 1970 Hijacking
- Jeremi Suri: Texas Higher Ed Conflict "Doesn't Have to Be This Way"
Trending Now
- New transcript of Ayn Rand at West Point in 1974 shows she claimed “savage" Indians had no right to live here just because they were born here
- The Mexican War Suggests Ukraine May End Up Conceding Crimea. World War I Suggests the Price May Be Tragic if it Doesn't
- The Vietnam War Crimes You Never Heard Of