Justice Elena Kagan hasn’t written many opinions this time period — 11 in complete, together with her concurrences and dissents — however her remarks to the Ninth Judicial Circuit earlier as we speak Zhong talks about rather a lot, together with how she handles conditions the place she feels pissed off by selections that do not go in addition to they need to.
Earlier this 12 months, Justice Sotomayor admit Kagan sometimes cried over closed-door selections, however admitted he had a unique response: “I perceive the place the frustration comes from. I am extra of a wall-breaker.”
Probably the most hanging side of Justice Kagan’s remarks issues the potential for an enforceable ethics rule on the Supreme Court docket. from PoliticoReport,
“It is a criticism that guidelines normally include enforcement mechanisms, however this algorithm doesn’t,” Kagan advised a convention of federal judges and attorneys.
Kagan stated she welcomed The code announced by the court last November However the lack of any technique of enforcement is a evident oversight.
“It is a tough factor to determine precisely who ought to be doing this and what the sanctions are for breaking the foundations, however I really feel like, regardless of how tough it’s, we will and will strive to determine some mechanisms to do this,” . . .
“I feel it might be actually dangerous if we did this to one another,” she advised the ninth Judicial Circuit.
Another choice she recommended can be to create some sort of committee of decrease court docket judges who may think about ethics complaints in opposition to sitting judges. She additionally recommended that establishing such an enforcement mechanism may gain advantage judges wrongfully accused of unethical conduct.
“It could present a secure harbor…generally individuals accuse us of inappropriate conduct that we weren’t concerned in. So I feel it might be a good suggestion to each implement the foundations in opposition to individuals who break them and to guard individuals who do not break them.” For individuals who have these laws, I feel a system like this is smart,” she stated.
Justice Kagan additionally expressed concern concerning the proliferation of concurring opinions that search to distort or reframe the bulk opinion (one thing Justice Kagan has hardly ever performed this semester, writing solely two concurring opinions).
“Everyone seems to be attempting to elucidate it a method or one other,” Kagan stated. “Individuals usually use dissenting opinions to pre-determine points that haven’t been correctly introduced earlier than the court docket and which will come earlier than the court docket inside a 12 months or two and attempt to give a sign as to how the decrease courts ought to resolve, however I do not assume that is proper.” . . .
“I do not know the way the decrease courts ought to deal with this subject. For probably the most half, I feel they need to deal with it by principally ignoring it,” she stated.
