Monthly Archives: March 2003

So I received a copy of the March 31 issue of Forbes with a note from the editor in chief: “You might be interested in one Continue reading →

Orin Kerr is a careful and powerful critic (in the good sense of that term) of much in the law of cyberspace. He has posted a careful and powerful criticism of my post yesterday. So too have others. But the line I agree with most strongly in Orin’s post is: “the public domain will be best served if Eldred is treated as a launching point for legislative reform, not an example of judicial foul play.”

Agreed. And as I’m the least qualified person to comment on the matter (as I’m the most biased person who has a view on the matter), my efforts are devoted to the future, not this past. My claim was not “foul play” or, as others have said, “corruption.” It was instead the sort of criticism that one can only make of an institution one respects: consistency. The obligations of consistency about principle across cases extend at least to those justices who believe in the principle. They don’t extend to justices who have dissented from the principle. Thus the burden or justifying and distinguishing Lopez falls on those who signed the Lopez/Morrison opinions. The other four (three of whom wrote the opinions in this case) are not, in my view, bound by that principle to say anything.

The point is not that a distinction couldn’t be drawn. The point is that they didn’t draw it. And the point is not that the Court must respond to every argument an advocate makes. But when two federal judges frame their dissent on the basis of a principle that also frames the petition upon which cert was granted, a certain decency would suggest something more than silence.

But I leave it to others to resolve the ethics of judicial principle as they apply to this case. There is lots of work to do that will matter much more. Continue reading →

So as the cruel master of fate would have it, on the day that the Eldred case officially ended, I was at Disney World. I was tricked into going to Disney World. I thought the conference was “in Orlando.” But Orlando has apparently morphed into Disney World, and so when yesterday the Court refused a request to rehear the case (totally expected), I learned the news while drinking coffee from a Mickey mug.

With that decision, a self-imposed silence about these things ends too. I accepted this silence after a respectful but strong rebuke by a friend. He objected that it was wrong for me to suggest that “the silent five” were acting without principle. I disagree. I do believe their decision lacked principle, but I also see that it was right to complain about the context within which I was making that charge.

So we filed a petition to rehear the case that made the claim of principle in as careful and balanced a way as possible. Again, such petitions are never granted any more. But if there is a place to express such criticism, respectful of the institution and tradition that these justices serve, it was in this form, without the pressure of publicity.

This stage is now over. I apologize for the silence. More hopeful stuff soon. Continue reading →