Justice Breyer (looking a bit older of late) was on Stephen Colbert to promote his new book. Stevens once was on his old show and it was a pretty informative seven minutes. Breyer was on his show before.
His appearance this time was rather boring overall. He refused to talk about specific legal questions such as the meaning of "insurrection" in the Fourteenth Amendment. He's retired. He's allowed to talk about it now. Breyer criticized the abortion and gun cases in his book. He barely talked about the specifics of the book. Or much of anything. Yawn.
ETA: He confirmed in a later appearance that he is still on senior status and plans to continue to serve on the bench. So, fair enough.
Clarence Thomas Again
The NYT had a long article on Breyer's pal (Thomas sat next to him on the bench for years and his hearty laugh can be heard regularly) and his new clerk, Crystal Clayton. We covered her before.
She has received a lot of attention over the years, particularly for her involvement in Turning Point USA, a conservative group. This includes an infamous text (which the conservatives have tried to pretend was just made up) about hating black people. The group let her go and Clarence and Ginny Thomas took her in. The article provides a lot of details.
The whole thing is a bit tedious. She was part of a conservative group and made some nasty comments as a junior member. There was some attempt to make her some sort of martyr, which is bullshit. Her being appealing to Thomas is not surprising. She benefited from connections. So it goes.
The basic problem -- shades of Kavanaugh perhaps -- is that she is made out to be a martyr and doesn't just apologize for some crude statements she made in the past. Some single turn of the phrase by Sotomayor in speeches about being a wise Latina was deemed so racist. Imagine if she said -- and her supporters gaslit it as a rightist lie -- she hated white people.
There is talk that it is unethical for Thomas to help her by making her a clerk given the family's connections. Maybe so. Clerks get some inside help? That is so shocking. As sins go, this is one of the more venial ethical ones. The article is more of an interesting -- not totally negative -- look behind the curtain at the family life of a Supreme Court justice.
The media needs to find some interesting stuff about other justices.
Oral Arguments
Breyer would have enjoyed the abortion pill oral argument. The justices were dubious about standing and not interested in the merits. Breyer loves it when the Court does not break into the typical liberal/conservative splits. Alito was the only one who seemed gung ho with Thomas interested in the argument the Comstock Act requires a ban on abortion pills.
This is a dubious reading of the law, especially as it was understood in the 20th Century. The courts interpreted the law not to apply to legitimate medical usage. The law was already amended to excise the contraceptive ban. There is now a push from some quarters to just repeal it.
This seems overall to be a good idea since it lies as a loaded gun akin to zombie state abortion bans that could be used after Dobbs. It is not only possible that some future administration will use the argument. This case might be back in some form with another attempt at standing.
The other arguments were not as noteworthy. There will be another abortion case next month.
Miscellaneous Orders
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