THE WISDOM OF THE BENCH: How Barr Alex Ehimhantie Aidaghese Successfully Predicted the Saving of the Integrity of the American Supreme Court by Chief Justice John G Roberts. November 22, 2022
OCTOBER 08, 2018
Now that the American apex court is packed full with a convincing conservative majority following the addition of Justice Brett Kavanaugh to the bench, conservative ideologically biased decisions are assured. Republicans are celebrating, while liberal voices and progressive interest groups are in grief mode. And it's understandable.
But is that the kind of Supreme Court - one whose decision is easily predictable - that Chief Justice Robert is comfortable presiding over? I don't think so.
Justice David H Souter was appointed by President George Bush elder (a Republican) in 1990. But the appointment didn't yield the expected dividends. Republicans were inadvertently sold a dummy.
Justice David Souter, a conservative-thinking jurist, became an ideological centrist - a swing voter throughout his years at the apex court. Thereby making it difficult for litigants and legal scholars to predict the outcome of most cases before the apex court.
Today, Roe v Wade is on the line. Affirmative Action is always on the line. And same-sex marriage may be resurrected. But who will play Justice David Souter to ensure purposeful justice in the one body whose decisions are unassailable - next only to God? That is the question.
Do not expect Justice Samuel Alito to ever wear a neutral gown. He was once videotaped shaking his head, whispering "not true" while President Obama was making a State of the Union Address.
Count Uncle Clarence Thomas out. He is the heir apparent to the late extreme right constitutionalist, Justice Antonin Scalia's throne at the apex court. Besides, his resentment of populist and minority-favored policies is well documented.
And Justice Neil Gorsuch? He is Donald Trump's apologist. Therefore, he is easily eliminated.
So, who is the emerging candidate for the role of ideological centrality within the conservative super majority corner at the U.S. Supreme Court?
And the answer is in the hands of the gentleman who bears the cross: Chief Justice John G Robert. I arrived at this conclusion for two major reasons.
One. As a genuine (unpretentious) gentleman, an outstanding jurist, and a family man to boot, I can see him adopting informed reasoning, recognized in laws and ethics to sustain the prestige, Integrity, dignity, and reputations of the custodian of the last hope of the aggrieved - his Supreme Court - by voting not just his conscience, but guided by facts, fundamental principles of fairness, the applicable laws, and the overall circumstances surrounding the case. He cannot afford to do less.
And two, his two decisions in the Obama Affordable Healthcare Law that came before the court, provoked a disturbing disbelief within the Republicans and conservative intelligentsia circle. First, he rejected the constitutional challenges to the Act. And in the second case, he ruled in favor of tax subsidies for Affordable Healthcare Laws. In fact, he wrote the majority decision in one of the cases. Unpredictable outcomes, no doubt.
In light of these decisions, I have cause to hope that when push comes to shove, Chief Justice John G Roberts, will vote his conscience, the laws, and the facts, without resorting to political correctness and ideological cum legal mumble jumble to circumvent justice, with a view to appeasing the far Rights. It won't.
And I pray.
NOVEMBER 21, 2018 - About A Month After
Justice John Roberts of the US Supreme Court and a Lesson in Judicial Activism for Justice Bulkachuwa and Justice Ibrahim Tanko Muhammad of Nigeria.
"You go the 9th Circuit and it's a disgrace," "And I'm going to put in a major complaint because you cannot win — if you're us — a case in the 9th Circuit and I think it's a disgrace. This was an Obama judge. And I'll tell you what, it's not going to happen like this anymore." President Donald Trump, a Republican.
“We do not have Obama judges or Trump judges, Bush judges or Clinton judges. What we have is an extraordinary group of dedicated judges doing their level best to do equal right to those appearing before them,” “The independent judiciary is something we should all be thankful for.” - Chief Justice John Roberts, USA Supreme Court., nominated to the US Supreme Court by President Judge Bush, a Republican.
That was Chief Justice John Roberts, in an unprecedented no-hold-barred declaration, taking upbraid at President Donald Trump for casting a Judge "an Obama Judge," because the Judge reaches a decision that was inconsistent with President Trump's immigration agenda. For the purpose of records, Chief Justice John Robert was nominated to the US Supreme Court by President George Bush, a Republican like President Donald Trump.
In terms of modern American jurisprudence, Chief John Robert is an enigma. He is unpredictable, to say the least. And when the conservative minority expected him to exude his conservative legal bearing and kill Obamacare, he demurred. He upstaged conventional judicial wisdom and gave life to the new law.
What you may find interesting, and of course, the reason I write this essay is that when Chief Justice John Robert was nominated to the US Supreme Court by President George Bush, Mr. Obama, as a Senator from Illinois at the time, voted against Robert's confirmation. And thanks to the Republican majority in the US Senate, Justice John Robert was confirmed, not just as an Associate Justice, but the Chief Justice of the US Supreme Court.
A few years later, Senator Obama ran for and was elected US President, succeeding President Bush. And you would expect a pound of flesh from Chief John Roberts; forget it.
After bailing out the US Economy from the brink of recession, President Obama decided to grab the bull by the horns and go for the kill - pushing for the passage into law of the Affordable Healthcare Act.
In spite of the crude intransigence and filibuster of Republican members of Congress, the Bill was passed into law by a narrow margin. And it was not yet a Uhuru.
Before the ink could dry up from the face of the paper that the Bill was signed into law, Republicans in droves, went to courts at both State and Federal levels, propounding, most often, an unintelligible narrative for judicial killing. Unintelligible and vexatious because the philosophy underlying the Bill was first put to test by a Republican Governor in Massachusetts. In spite of everything, I was worried. And Americans were worried.
Given the harshness of Senator Obama's vocabulary during Justice Robert's confirmation hearing, it was overwhelmingly expected that payback time has come for Chief Justice John Roberts. However, when the decision time came, he voted with the majority, affirming Obamacare as the law of the land. Republican conservative pundits cried foal - President George Bush sold us a dummy!
Not done, the antagonists of Obamacare, went to court again. And when the case came up before the US Supreme Court the second time, Republicans in unison expected a reprieve from the Chief Justice to wit, he is going to atone for his sin of the past and vote along the ideological line and kill the Law. They were wrong. The Chief Justice did not only vote to keep Obamacare, but he also did, to the chagrin of Americans, author the majority opinion.
And just last year, he made the declaration quoted above.
Today, Americans, and specifically, legal scholars and pundits are finding it difficult to predict the outcome of the few cases that come before the Supreme Court as the culture was prior to the ascension of the throne as the Chief Justice by Justice John Roberts.
JUNE 18, 2020
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He Did it Again: Chief Justice John Robert and the Triumph of Real Justice in the American Supreme Court.
Last week, it was LGBT. The Supreme Court grants federal job protections to gay, lesbian, and transgender workers.
"Chief Justice Roberts sided with Associate Justice Neil Gorsuch and the liberals in ruling that a federal law banning sex discrimination in the workplace applies to sexual orientation and gender identity."
Today, it is DACA. Your underage kids who are in America illegally are no longer subject to deportation or excluded from the path of the American Dream. "Trump's effort to end the DACA program that protects 650,000 young, undocumented immigrants from possible deportation and Louisiana's effort to impose restrictions on abortion clinics – Roberts threw in with the court's liberals in 5-4 rulings."
A few years ago, I told you that Chief Justice Roberts, though appointed to the Supreme Court by a Republican President, is going to save the Bench and uphold the integrity and fundamental values of the then ideologically polarized Supreme Court. More than five landmark decisions later, I cannot be more right.
After analyzing all the five conservative members of the apex court, my instinct told me that Chief Justice John Roberts is not going to preside over a Supreme Court whose decisions are easily predicted simply on political or ideological leaning. I took a gamble and I documented my thoughts. So far so good, he has done more than I anticipated.
Don't get me wrong, Chief Justice John Roberts isn't Liberal, far from it. However, he isn't what the Republicans expended. And they are not willing to conceal their disgust. Let's hear from a few of them after the SCOTUS decision on the DACA
"If Justice Roberts wants to be a politician, he should resign and run for office," Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., tweeted.
"The most disappointing week at SCOTUS in years," tweeted Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., who once served Roberts as a law clerk at the high court.
"Judging is not a game. It's not supposed to be a game," Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, intoned on the Senate floor. "But sadly, over recent years more and more, Chief Justice Roberts has been playing games with the court to achieve the policy outcomes he desires."
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