Scandal in the Supreme Court
The opinions expressed in this post are strictly those of the author and do not necessarily reflect opinions or positions held by Indivisible Northampton-Swing Left Western MA.
The Supreme Court seems to pile scandals on top of scandals with no one to reign in its members. Justice Clarence Thomas has enriched himself and his family by accepting gifts worth more than ten million dollars from rich Republican mega donors in the form of private flights, luxury yacht vacations, a bible owned by Frederick Douglas (worth $19,000), two year of tuition payments to a posh private school for Thomas’ nephew and even selling his mother’s house to a donor who then let her live there for years for free. Thomas did not even disclose these “gifts” on his taxes: something he is legally required to do. Perhaps we should have listened to Anita Hill during his confirmation hearings to become a justice..
There are other scandals: During his tenure, Chief Justice John Roberts’ wife (Jane Roberts) earned millions of dollars as a legal recruiter for placing lawyers in firms that were doing business with the Supreme Court. \nThe scandal is not only on the conservative Republican side. Justice Sotomayor did not recuse herself from a case involving her publisher.But nothing quite matches the extremes of Clarence Thomas’ behavior and his blatant disregard of the law and ethics too..\nWhen Chief Justice Roberts was asked about who watches to ensure that the Supreme Court members follow a code of ethics (note that all other judges and lawyers are required to follow a code of ethics or can be disbarred), he replied that he was comfortable with a self guided one. To me, this appears as reasonable and effective as putting a fox in charge of protecting the chickens….
“Trust us!” they say. Wink! Wink!I urge you to contact our Senators and Congressman to pressure the Supreme Court to agree to follow a set of ethics rules like the ones that other judges already have and must follow. If they don’t, they can be disbarred. Why is the highest court in the United States not monitored by anyone and allowed to do what they please when it comes to ethics. And perhaps sell their votes to the highest bidder.