Who are these people, what is their theory of the Constitution? And why are they crossways with Scalia?
Do you have a name I can search on, to see what they think?
The underlying assumption of the CIE movement is that the last 100 years of expansion of Federal power is a subversion of the constitution. It’s hard to find a non-partisan account of the movement, so I’d suggest you GOOGLE “Constitution in Exile” or “Federalist Society", look around, and reach your own judgments.
That said. the basic assumption of CIE proponents is that many powers assumed by the Federal Government (examples, depending on who you were talking to, might include environmental regulation, labor law, the appropriate role of religion in the political system, the regulation of medical practitioners and the like) - should devolve back to the states. In the case of more extreme CIE arrangements you would have essentially sovereign states subject to only very limited Federal authority.
This an argument that doesn’t always align very will with the goals of some “conservative" interests, for example those who wish to exert uniform Federal control over personal behavior (ex: national probations against abortion or pornography) or those who seek efficient national markets (larger insurers for example, are pressing for a Federal takeover of regulation of their industry to forestall action by State Attorney Generals). Sometimes, this conflict extends even to individual opinions, it’s not hard to find individual conservatives who would welcome a federally enforced ban on abortion but are also opposed to the current federal efforts to thwart state “medical marijuana” laws.
Still, though the situation is sometimes complicated, it’s possible to discern the general leanings of SC Justices, and on such matter Thomas is closer to the CIE view, while Scalia is more deferential to federal power.
On this matter Scalia and Thomas can’t both be the President’s “favorite justice”, and if one or the other becomes Chief Justice, he will clearly be siding, roughly, with either the Corporate or the Social Conservative wing of the party.
As the president will need the support of united Republican Senate to confirm his nominees, it seem to me the safe “political” choice would be someone who agrees with the president on such issues, but has not left a “paper trail” that would upset either side of the CIE debate.