Opinion: Clarence Thomas Is the new Chief Justice

CNN ^ | July 22, 2021 | Jeffrey Toobin

[where's_the_Outrage?]

In the waning days of Donald Trump's presidency, Amy Coney Barrett won confirmation to the Supreme Court and Clarence Thomas received an equally consequential promotion -- to Chief Justice of the United States.

Not officially, of course. John G. Roberts, Jr., retains the title and the middle seat on the Supreme Court bench. But the Chief Justice has just one essential power that differentiates his role from that of the other Justices. The Chief has the right to assign the court's opinions when he is in the majority. When the Chief Justice is in the minority, though, the assignment power goes to the senior Associate Justice who is in the majority.

Thomas, who was confirmed in 1991, is now the longest tenured Justice on the court. More notably, he is now the leading figure among the five solid conservatives on the court -- Thomas himself, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Barrett.

In crucial, contested cases, Chief Justice Roberts has increasingly been voting with the three remaining liberals -- Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan. If Roberts continues this pattern, that means Thomas will be the senior Justice in several significant 5 to 4 cases and thus enjoy the right to assign majority opinions, including, of course, to himself.

[where's_the_Outrage?]

CNN almost makes sense for once. Of course, the just have to be CNN: "Even among conservatives during Thomas's earlier years on the court, his views were seen as extreme and eccentric."

[cockroach_magoo]

CNN just resents the idea that a black person could have real power.

[monkeyshine]

I’ll defer to the experts but I thought I read that most of the cases over the years are decided pretty lopsided... like unanimous or 7-2 or the like. It’s only the big tough decisions that tend to come in 5-4 and it is possible they vote that way just for appearances, knowing the outcome one justice will go with the minority to make it look more split. Again, I defer to the experts.

[ALPAPilot]

Justice Thomas should be the Chief Justice, but GW Bush was a racist coward.

[sauropod]

"... solid conservatives on the court -- Thomas himself, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Barrett."

Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and Barret "solid conservatives?"

Funny. They aren't acting as such.

[nickcarraway]

First of all, SCOTUS is nonpartisan, there is nomajority or minority.

Second, there is no conservative majority. And Kavanaugh and Gorsuch are to the left of Roberts. On big decisions he usually strays, but smaller decisions he's more likely to be conservative. Barrett is too early to tell.

Thomas and Alito are a block of two.

[snuffy smiff]

Personally, I have yet to see much of anything conservative from Kavanaugh and Barrett.

[nickcarraway]

As much as I don't like Bush, that is not true. I am not sure Thomas would even want that role, he wasn't even known for talking much then.

He could have easily made Scalia chief justice.

[nickcarraway]

Kavanaugh and Gorsuch were never "solid conservatives," and no informed person would say that. They were Anthony Kennedy clerks.

Barrett was a Scalia clerk. I think we haven't see enough to her to be fair.

[lee martell]

I think C. Thomas is waiting for the right moment to retire.

[where's_the_Outrage?]

Agree about not liking Bush and not true. As I remember it gave Bush the opportunity to select a young conservative to be the Chief Justice for a long time.

Unfortunately, most selectees lose their perspective once they get to the SCOTUS, as seen with Trump’s selectees.

[Lurkinanloomin]

Personally, I have yet to see much of anything conservative from Kavanaugh and Barrett.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Agree and Gorsuch sides with the Celebrate Perversity crowd.

[Valpal1]

“the opportunity to select a young conservative to be the Chief Justice for a long time.”

A poorly thought out and even more poorly executed strategy.

A sure conservative chief justice for ten or fifteen years would have been far better than the potential young “conservative” for thirty years given the history and habit of judges to “grow” in office.

[BillyBoy]

I strongly advocated Bush elevate Thomas from Associate Justice to CJ at the time. I favored Thomas over Scalia because he was younger (he'd still be CJ now, 15 years later, if he had been appointed back in 2006) and less of a lightning rod than Scalia. Plus we would have had the "first black as head of a branch of government", which of course the media would have ignored and not given Bush any credit for.

To be fair though, its extremely rare that Presidents elevate a sitting Associate Justice to Chief, apparently because it rubs their colleagues the wrong way and "upsets the balence of the court" when a younger less experience justice gets elevated over a more senior SCOTUS justice. Rehnquist was obviously an exception to the "Presidents don't elevate sitting SCOTUS judges" rule, as was Harlan F. Stone. LBJ tried and failed miserably to elevate associate justice Abe Fortas to CJ in an 11th hour power grab before Nixon was sworn in.

Anyhoo, If Bush had stuck with his original plan of putting Roberts in as O'Connor's replacement, there wouldn't have been much ideological shift at all, and its possible Roberts wouldn't have drifted as left as he is now due to his status as CJ (if Roberts had remained as "conservative" as he was in 2005, he would have been a major upgrade from O'Connor)

Putting Roberts in as CJ was a big blunder on Bush's part, though I think Trump's SCOTUS nominees are even bigger blunder. I think most FReepers now accept that instead of "cementing a conservative majority" we only have TWO solid conservatives on SCOTUS, although its too early to tell if Barrett will step up (so far she's been a disappointment)

[Diogenesis]

The owned Servant of Malta and Epstein Island.

[nickcarraway]

lose their perspective once they get to the SCOTUS, as seen with Trump’s selectees.

That's completely false. Kavanaugh and Gorsuch are exactly where their track record suggested they'd be. If anything, they are a little to the right of where expected.

Gorsuch and Kavanaugh were proteges of Anthony Kennedy, who was rated a little left of center. Amd logically, they'd be a little left of that.

Gorsuch was on the court for over a year with Kennedy, and during that time he was significantly to the left of Kennedy.

Bottom line is that Gorsuch and Kennedy haven't changed at all. They are exactly as expected.

[nickcarraway]

I hate say I told you so...

I said this about Gorsuch and Kavanaugh from the beginning and I was pilloried for it. The evidence was there, but most Freepers didn't want to listen.

[Pikachu_Dad]

Justices are elected for a very long time period.

I will give the newbies the benefit of the doubt !

And time to grow into their roles !!!

[Tupelo]

>>> GW Bush was a racist coward<<<

Not sure I would go along with the racist part.

[unclebankster]

“The evidence was there, but most Freepers didn’t want to listen.”

You’re more fluent about Constitutional Law then most members of Free Republic, including myself.

While I’ll uphold the Constitution, I think lawyers & judges are a waste of sperm,egg,time, & money.

So I really don’t care what these morons do, as long as their retarded decisions don’t effect me.

“State and local nullification works for me.”