This month, the U.S. Judicial Conference issued new ethics guidelines, a publication that rarely attracts attention beyond a small circle of legal nerds. These guidelines, however, are not just the usual tweaks on rules governing free meals or travel. They include a new policy that could materially alter the character of the American courts, allowing judges to engage in commentary to rebut what they deem “illegitimate forms of criticism and attacks.” It is not just injudicious, it is dangerous.
Over two centuries ago, the Framers had to sell the Constitution to skeptical states leery about yielding power to a central government, including federal courts. In Federalist #78, Alexander Hamilton sought to put these fears aside and assured the states that the federal judiciary is “the least dangerous to the political rights of the Constitution; because it will be least in a capacity to annoy or injure them.”
One can certainly disagree with Hamilton whether history has borne out his prediction that the court would have the least capacity to “annoy” others in our system. However, Hamilton’s pitch would later be reinforced by the adoption of apolitical ethical standards in our courts that separated them from political activities and commentary.
It did not begin that way. Early federal judges, including Supreme Court justices, were often openly partisan. Federalist judges took active roles in hunting down Jeffersonians under the infamous Alien and Sedition Acts.
That changed as the nation embraced a new model of judges who would stand apart from politics. While judges often reflect the ideological views of the presidents who nominated them, they have largely followed rigid rules that have prevented them from engaging in political commentary. Judges are expected to address the legal issues in their opinions and leave political commentary to others regarding the implications or basis of those opinions.
It has not been a perfect system. Recently, some of us have criticized judges who have made overtly political statements in their opinions or in public. The deviation from the traditional line of judicial silence has grown in recent years.
I previously wrote about this pattern of extrajudicial commentary, including inappropriate commentary in court statements and opinions. These comments often undermined the integrity of the court and the public’s faith in the neutrality of our judges.
District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan, an Obama appointee, was criticized for failing to recuse herself from the Special Counsel’s case against President Donald Trump after she made highly controversial statements about him from the bench. Chutkan lashed out at “a blind loyalty to one person who, by the way, remains free to this day.” That “one person” was still under investigation at the time, and when Trump was charged, Chutkan refused to let the case go.
Chutkan later doubled down when asked to dismiss a case due to Trump pardoning Jan. 6 defendants. After acknowledging that she could not block the pardons, she proclaimed that the pardons could not change the “tragic truth” and “cannot whitewash the blood, feces and terror that the mob left in its wake. And it cannot repair the jagged breach in America’s sacred tradition of peacefully transitioning power.”
One of Chutkan’s colleagues, Judge Beryl Howell, also an Obama appointee, denounced a Trump policy as “a revisionist myth relayed in this presidential pronouncement.”
Then there is Judge Amit Mehta, another Obama appointee, who has been criticized for conflicted rulings in Trump cases and his bizarre (and ultimately abandoned) effort to banish January 6th defendants from the Capitol. He called Trump’s policies “shameful.”
D.C. Circuit Judge Reggie Walton called Trump a “charlatan.”
U.S. District Judge Robert Pratt of the Southern District of Iowa made public comments calling Trump a “criminal.”
Other federal judges have made other public statements denouncing Trump and Republican priorities. Even before this change, these judges felt that they could engage in such political declarations.
Even Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson declared publicly how she sees her position as a judge “as a wonderful opportunity to tell people in my opinions how I feel about the issues, and that’s what I try to do.”
Last year, the Supreme Court condemned U.S. District Judge William Young, a Reagan appointee, for his attacks on Trump as a bully bent on “retribution.” He also accused the administration of “racial discrimination” and “discrimination against the LGBTQ community,” and asked in one order, “Have we no shame?”
There is no paucity of such criticism in our country. Many pundits have leveled such attacks against the President, but this was a sitting judge. These judges are using their offices to amplify their personal outrage over policies. The result is that they are erasing the distinction between our courts and our politics.
Given these increasingly injudicious comments, one would think that Chief Justice John Roberts and the Judicial Conference would seek to tighten, not loosen, the limits on judicial commentary.
I am not suggesting that these past statements would be viewed as acceptable under the new rules. However, I fail to understand, in light of such controversial statements, the Conference elected to relax the rules at this time. I fail to see why it is so intolerable for judges to leave such commentary to others as the cost of holding one of these privileged Article III positions in our system.
In this “age of rage,” it is more important than ever that our judges stand above the political debate and distemper. The public needs to look to one branch that is detached and deliberative, rather than participants in our national pandemonium.
I have long admired Chief Justice Roberts and have been sympathetic to his efforts to defend the courts, including his response to personal attacks on judges by the President and others. I have also opposed calls to impeach judges such as James Boasberg despite my strong disagreement with some of his past opinions.
However, this ill-conceived change could not come at a worse time. Just as federal judges are raising eyebrows over their extrajudicial comments, the Conference is giving them a green light for such commentary.
What the new advisory opinion calls “measured defense” of the judiciary is so vague that the most irresponsible judges are likely to pour into the breach. They can now speak out against any threats that they deem are “undermining judicial independence or the rule of law..regardless of whether these comments rise to the level of persecution.”
In 2024, Chief Justice Roberts spoke of activities that “either threaten the judges themselves,” including “Violence, intimidation, disinformation, and threats to defy court orders.”
Many of us supported him in those comments. The Chief Justice has historically spoken for the bench on such threats.
Now, however, he and the Conference have enabled other jurists to engage in such commentary to the detriment of the judiciary as a whole. They will now face a slippery slope on what constitutes a “measured defense” by judges eager to further push the envelope on allowable commentary.
The added freedom afforded to judges to engage in commentary will do little to change the debate. It may, however, greatly erode the trust in what was once considered “our least dangerous branch.”
Jonathan Turley is a law professor and author of the New York Times bestseller “Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution.”
Here are the new guidelines: New Judicial Guidelines
FederalFeral judges.All Hail “The Dictatorship of the Black-Robed Juristocracy!”
Which must have been impeached and convicted for egregious and momentous crimes of high office against the United States of America, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights long, long ago.
“…courts…must…declare all acts contrary to the manifest tenor of the Constitution void.”
“…men…do…what their powers do not authorize, [and] what [their powers] forbid.”
__________________________________________________________________________________________
“[A] limited Constitution … can be preserved in practice no other way than through the medium of courts of justice, whose duty it must be to declare all acts contrary to the manifest tenor of the Constitution void. Without this, all the reservations of particular rights or privileges would amount to nothing … To deny this would be to affirm … that men acting by virtue of powers may do not only what their powers do not authorize, but what they forbid.”
– Alexander Hamilton
@Anonymous
Really: could you all that are not troll Anonymous please make screen names? Change them weekly if you need to. You have to realize these are not permanent or traceable, make a temporary email address, or multiple ones, if you must. It’s easy. No one will track you.
If you are really that high priority you would know this, and the trolls themselves should prove this point; they do it every day. So much salience lost because the rest of us scroll past you out of respect for our own sanity. It makes me doubt your credibility, frankly, when truly anonymous tools are so freely available. If you continue to insist, then please explain, in your anonymity, why.
At this point I mostly think you are lazy, and that is not something I’m happy to say. Your comments are good, do better than a stranger in the night, because that is what you are right now. None of us are impressed by ‘celebrity’, just humanity, so if that is a thing, throw that away, too. Nobody here cares. We care about the rule of law and the future of our country.
“could you all that are not troll Anonymous please make screen names”
I made a longer post on this, but the short version is that he capability has again disappeared. Tried 2 browsers on 2 computers, same result. Don’t blame the posters, blame site management, whoever they are…
Estovir, the anonymity began years ago because you kept smearing the names people were using while constantly changing names yourself.
Maybe we should all use anonymous. Just like good socialist, we’ll all be equal and the same.
So what you don’t like is trolling. That right?
Try and focus on their words, what they’re saying not on a name.
You do realize that you’re anonymous and a troll. Right?
“YOU CAN’T HANDLE THE TRUTH!”
– Colonel Nathan R. Jessup
_______________________________
This is but one forum for Americans to exercise their freedom of speech and engage in debate.
You need a particular name in order for your irrelevant ad hominem to be even minimally effective.
The Supreme Court and judicial branch have not “…[declared] all acts contrary to the manifest tenor of the Constitution void” since 1860, and America has suffered into its current communism.
Clearly, you do not agree and cannot effectively refute the preceding text, leaving you only one option, which is to rant incoherently.
Congratulations, Einstein.
Professor Turley,
I’m struck that the only derogatory comments from judges you quote are those appointed by Democrats. And you completely fail to mention any of the criticisms of judges by Trump himself. Just to refresh your memory:
Key details regarding Trump’s actions towards judges:
Targeting Families: Trump targeted Judge Merchan’s daughter on social media, calling her a “rabid Trump hater” and accusing her of bias, which led to a gag order prohibiting attacks on staff and family.
Gag Order Violations: In the New York criminal case, Trump was held in contempt multiple times for violating gag orders that restricted him from attacking court personnel and families.
Criticism of the Judiciary: Trump has a history of attacking judges who rule against him, calling them “disgraces” and urging recusal, such as in cases involving Justice Sonia Sotomayor, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Judge Amy Berman Jackson.
Calls for Impeachment: Trump has previously called for the impeachment of federal judges who ruled against his administration, prompting a rare rebuke from Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts.
You continue to bemoan the “age of rage” and yet all you do is fan the flames of the “Dems are the bad guys here” argument. I wish I could say you were better than that – but we know by now that you’re not. You’ve become a Trump sycophant and profit-seeking lickspittle. So sad…
“[The Supreme Court and judicial branch are] the least dangerous to the political rights of the Constitution; because it will be least in a capacity to annoy or injure them.”
– Professor Turley et al.
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Are you out of your —-ing minds?!!!
Let’s revisit the American inflection point when the communist, inimical, and pusillanimous throttlebottoms of the Supreme Court stood by while the tyrant “Crazy Abe” Lincoln engaged in “presidential nullification,” unconstitutionally and forcibly imposed martial law, unconstitutionally suspended habeas corpus, unconstitutionally denied not-prohibited and fully constitutional secession, and commenced an unconstitutional war against a sovereign foreign nation, then proceeded with the five years of his “Reign of Terror,” ultimately placing America on a course to its current communist welfare state status in the manner of his fellow traveler, Karl Marx, while destroying most of the Constitution and Bill of Rights, with emphasis on the severe limitations on taxation and regulation of Article 1, Section 8, the absolute right to private property in the 5th Amendment…
and so on into the 20th and now 21st centuries.
Gorsuch Warned About Trump
Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch is having an ‘I told you so’ moment when it comes to President Trump’s tariffs.
At November’s blockbuster arguments, Gorsuch raised alarm about what he called a “one-way ratchet” of authority from Congress to the president if Trump wins a case that challenges his use of emergency powers to impose duties on a host of countries.
“It’s going to be veto-proof,” Gorsuch warned of Trump’s declared emergencies.
“What president’s ever going to give that power back? A pretty rare president. So how should that inform our view?”
Gorsuch’s concern is now in the limelight as the justices prepare to return to the bench to issue opinions on three separate days between now and next Wednesday.
From Today’s ‘The Hill’
Pure poppycock!
The Constitution “told you so.”
The judicial and legislative branches possess NO executive power.
The legislative branch has the power to legislate; the judicial branch has the power to judge, and the executive branch has the power to execute.
The legislative branch may write the law, and the judicial branch may issue a decision, and neither may compel any execution.
No legislation or adjudication may usurp or exercise any aspect, facet, or degree of executive power.
No amount of persistence, prevarication, equivocation, or mendacity has any power to alter or modify those facts.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Article 1, Section 1
All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________
Article 2, Section 1
The executive power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America.
__________________________________________________________________________________________
Article 3, Section 1
The judicial Power of the United States, shall be vested in one supreme Court.
_____________________________________________________________________________________
Merriam-Webster
judge (i.e. judicial)
verb
1: to form an opinion about through careful weighing of evidence and testing of premises
The public knows federal judges are not neutral. They are politicians like any other and they have political views and biases. Muzzling judges from commentary does not change what they believe, it just hides it from the public.
And for being partial and biased they must be impeached and convicted.
the schism happened a generation ago: in all of society. telecommunications and social contagion. the far left has no standards, morals, and therefore no shame. dont expect weak-kneed persons to tell then “No”. They get away with all forms of bad behavior because they are protected above and throughtout society now. There is only one result of the Schism and it has played out these last several years. The escalation into murders is a middle step. It will take someone stronger-willed and with more convictions than Trump has to deal with it as needed.
When laws are written with refutable, confutative or contestable meaning(s) it allows deceivers to read anything they like into the meaning(s). Indubitably there are signs that our governing principles are under attack by the semiautonomous courts that make judgments based on personal beliefs regardless of the law, causing confusion and doubt. There are also political and media figures cheering them on for usurping written law [even escorting the lawless to safety, wasn’t that something].
When doubt creeps into the lexicon of the law and the government that enforces the law, the law becomes suspect, leaving the door ajar for charlatans of all strips to wreak havoc. Despotism (in the broadest sense Communism) comes to mind.
Guilty by damn, I see it in your eyes, to the gallows I say!
@GW
‘Despotism (in the broadest sense Communism) comes to mind. ‘
Yes, it does, and it has on the modern left for some time. I never imagined it could go to the extremes it currently has, but we never imagined an interconnected world where wealthy, fascist, globalists could exert such influence with the press of a button. It is all so upside down it is almost comical to anyone with a small knowledge of history and two brain cells to rub together.
There are logical reasons the institutional people hate Trump – that is not to say they are good reasons, or noble reasons, or sane reasons, or good logic. He is blowing up their chicanery on an epic scale, and they are not going to take that lightly.
Trump is not blowing up their chicanery (good word) on an epic scale. Or any scale. Hell, they impeached Trump the first time for the sins of the Bidens in Ukraine .. . and they’re all pleased as punch.
At 36% approval rating, Trump is not the answer to anything. .. hell, they’re probably busy plotting a return to power after the Nov. elections.
Trump is the spoiled, weak-minded, cunning personification of wealthy, powerful and ‘institutional people’.. . aka the swamp.
*see e.g., the Epstein Files
“Yes, it does, and it has on the modern left for some time. I never imagined it could go to the extremes it currently has…”
James, it sounds like you weren’t old enough to see the 1960s or feel the emergence of the New Left in 1956. I consider those years the beginning of today’s extreme leftist movement, which followed the split from the Stalinists. At that time, we saw the rise of the far-left movement, and since I’ve been on this blog, I’ve viewed them as a major future threat, worried that the bloodlust of the Stalinists never disappeared. I see it never does. That same bloodlust exists and must be controlled. Just look at the French Revolution, as discussed in Turley’s new book, which gives us a glimpse of the blood and gore inherent in man.
Discouraging indeed to know the Canons have no teeth. These sacred cows make up the rules that free them from accountability and even tell us they have no binding authority.
Lawyers pick their friends to become judges where they preside over their cases awarding BILLIONS of dollars to their pals.
Texas vs White is a good example of partisanship. The opinion was written by Salmon P. Chase, secretary of the treasury under Lincoln, and he merely parroted Lincoln/Republican claims that the Articles of Conferation, which were replaced by the Constitution, established “perpetual union.” If you actually read the Articles, one will see that they established friendship and cooperation between the states.
If you support and enforce the Constitution, secession is not prohibited and is fully constitutional, and secession is fully constitutional per the 10th Amendment.
There are no two ways about it.
Ask Chat or Gemini to throw out all superfluous-to-the-law precedents, doctrine, and other irrelevant decisions, and they will tell you that secession is constitutional.
Why? Because they are left with no other options, secession was and will always be constitutional.
People who didn’t like and support duly legislated law were compelled to find a legal and constitutional workaround—or just live with the law “as is.”
Dear Prof Turley,
Once more into the breach, dear friends.
What rules of engagement? Sec. of War Hegseth abolished the “stupid Rules of Engagement” last year. Sec. Hegseth untied the hands of our war-fighters . .. also, no more ‘beardos or fatsos’.
If Sec. Hegseth’s remarks cause any Judge’s spirit to wane, they, too, can do the honorable thing and resign.
*Trump then reiterated “America is under invasion from within” and that we should use some of these dangerous cities as training grounds for our newly unfettered war-fighters .. . and, by extension, any lingering activist Judges.
The United States does not have set “rules of engagement.” Rules of engagement are set for each conflict as it occurs. Personally, I am no fan of Hegseth and am not happy that Trump bombed Iran and question the Venezuela incident, but the Secretary of Defense and his staff are the ones who set rules of engagement, not the military services.
Each pull of the trigger is a separate engagement. If the DoD doesn’t issue a memo for each trigger pull, then it is not controlled by rules of engagement. It’s free-fire until told to stop, usually after months of deliberation and long after the otherwise illegal act has ended lives and maimed people.
I too am skeptical of ANY presidents military actions. Primarily because so many have ended so badly.
For me that is the real test.
I have no problem with arresting Maduro, but that was not the primary goal of that operation – or we would be out of the Caribean.
Given that the goals were larger, the measure of those actions will be the results and the duration of military involvement.
Prior to Sec. Hegseth, the U.S. did have set military Rules of Engagement. Traditionally set by the Joint Chiefs of Staff, numerous and various military training manuals, to the Uniform Code of Military Justice .. . Refer to them.
Military commanders are ultimately responsible for the ROE in any use of force. For example, some say the use of force, ROE, against civilian boats in the Caribbean would not comply with either national or international law.
I was surprised Truley used the term, ‘Rules of Engagement’, to describe an assault on non-political Judicial restraint.
*U.S. military rules of engagement (ROE) define when, where, how, and against whom force can be used, ensuring actions comply with both national and international law while minimizing harm to civilians.
What has your opinion regarding Hegseth got to do with this article ?
Under Hegseth Recruiting is up, performance standards are up. We have seen several major operations executed flawlessly.
Hegseth is doing fine.
Turley used the term ‘Rules of Engagement’ in the article.
‘Whiskey’ Pete is a pimp of Trump’s Rules of Engagement .. . masquerading as a ‘warrior’.
*we haven’t executed any military operations ‘flawlessly’ . .. since WWII
. Another nail, pafessir…
3rd world junk
In my view, in a free country, the actions and performance of anyone who makes decisions which can seriously affect the lives of others, should be closely intensely scrutinized and they should be held accountable in some fashion if they make serious errors. Doctors, lawyers, many professionals, are held accountable in the courts. (As a former MD, now retired, I know what it is like not only to be sued but also to have defend my license at a state board inquiry. In my case that defense was entirely successful but it was embedded in two years of other absolutely ugly events.) Many federal judges are appointed for life and can only be removed by impeachment by Congress. To me this is a recipe for the arrogant and out of control among them to run amok and I think we currently see such arrogance from a significant number of these judges. Do they think that they are perfect and therefore can get away with any remark or decision at any time? Perhaps my painful experience with the legal system is coloring my thoughts but frankly, if a judge errs, that judge should be held accountable and I mean any judge. The almost unsurmountable block placed in the path of those seeking to hold judges accountable, impeachment and conviction, in my view, in reality, means absolutely nothing in terms of properly dealing with judicial arrogance.
I don’t want to know the political opinions of my doctor or my priest, and I don’t intend to share mine with them: Too much is at stake. Given the extended education of any judge, you would expect them to be wise enough to avoid sacrificing the public’s respect by sounding off about politics. Let them come here to Jonathan’s website and spar with Anonymous.
Fascinating that you seem to think that judges have “extended education”.
Trump appointed many judges who were outright incompetent with virtually no experience.
The classic example was Justin Walker, a 37 year old lawyer appointed to a district court in Kentucky. After law school he did a couple of one year clerkships followed by one year in private practice. Unfortunately, he couldn’t cut it as a practicing lawyer, so he got a job at the University of Louisville where he taught “legal writing”, not any classes in the actual application of the law. When Trump selected him for a judgeship he had absolutely zero experience in a court. He had never tried a case as either lead or assistant counsel. In fact he had never set foot in any court room in any capacity as a legal professional. The day he took his seat in the court as a judge was the very first time he had appeared in any court in any official capacity.
Walker was approved by the Senate and assumed his new role in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. He was a United States district judge of the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Kentucky from 2019 to 2020.
“During remarks on the Senate floor leading up to the vote, Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said, ‘For those of us who know Justin Walker and have seen his work up close, it’s clear that President Trump made an outstanding choice to be a district judge for the Western District of Kentucky.'”
try again.
The key parts are these:
“After his clerkships, Walker returned to Gibson Dunn from 2012 to 2013. During the Brett Kavanaugh confirmation hearings for the Supreme Court, Walker gave 119 interviews to the media defending Kavanaugh, and gave several paid speeches to the Federalist Society. He has been a member of the Federalist Society since 2006.”
He’s another Federalist Society member who wrote a nastygram about “FBI Director James Comey and arguing, “calls for an independent F.B.I. are misguided and dangerous… the F.B.I. must not operate as an independent agency. It must be accountable to the President.””
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Justin_R._Walker#Early_life_and_education
and we had a President (Biden) who lied on his resumes, cheated on his LSAT, and made up stories about his qualifications.
Don’t think the Federalist Society would have welcomed him in. Maybe that’s why he became a Democrat.
Fine – but we see left wing nut Biden and Obama judges make Fundimental errors of law everyday.
A thoroughly inexperienced conservative appears to have a better understanding of the law than
even expereinced left wing nuts like Boasberg and Howell.
Take it up with the Federalist Society which is absolutely opposed to accountability in the judiciary as that would interfere with their take-over of the US Supreme Court and the majority of the Federal courts.
Jon, can you give a couple examples of where judges have been punished for the bias and lawlessness?
It virtually never happens!
It doesn’t happen because judges are right about Trump.
@Anonymous
What is it like to be so subsumed by hatred every day, all day? Do you even remember what good feelings feel like, and do you even know what it means to think of others without recompense? More and more I think that part of the brain simply didn’t get adequate development for younger leftists, and at this point that is anyone under 40.
Are you sure you’re pointing at the correct target? Your parents myelinated your brain, and later, your teachers and professors, not Trump, not the RNC. Are you aware that this drama is largely playing out within the confines of your own mind, and that many, many other people don’t even see it, let alone be bothered by it?
I suppose it could also just be doing what you are told for dollars, and you don’t actually care about any of it, because you are too stupid/ignorant of history to realize that the dollars won’t make one whit of a difference if you are subject to an *actual* totalitarian state. Maybe a combination of both. Either way, you are a child. There would be pity if you didn’t so actively destroy peace for others.
I’m sure AOC thinks she is playing her role and delivering her lines for a ’cause’, and there is conviction there, even if she is a tool, because she is also very, very stupid, and she grew up in manner that was very, very privileged.
People made their own soap and ate turnips during the depression because things were so tight; you are a joke, posting your nonsense with expensive technology on networks that someone else has to pay for. A total joke. Your inclination toward hostility and violence (which is to be expected of children raised the way you were) removes the humor. But we can still laugh at you, all the same. And we do.
If only you knew that peace in your own heart was the answer. You are too thick even for that.
“we can still laugh at you”
A reasoned approach to be sure.
@Anonymous
😂😂😂
Trump is going for a lifetime appointment. Be careful with your wishes
Yawn…
Not only aren;t the judges “right about Trump” – that is NOt their business and they MUST stay out of politics.
But over and over we find those same jufges that feel compelled to put politics before the law – are not even right bout the law.
And SCOTUS is wasting lots of time it could spend on cases with merit fixing idiotic lower court rulings that just gum up out judicial system
remember Democrats can’t even believe in basic science like man vs woman. They are fascists….set on destroying western society!
Stop indulging them!
What are we supposed to do then?
Sadly Jon Turley still thinks Democrats believe in the Rule of Law
The Democrats including Judges are fighting a Civil War to Destroy America
Open Borders, bankruptcy, lawlessness, drugs, releasing criminals, etc
Judge Robert is a traitor who has PUSHED the COURT LEFT! The recent democrat appointed judges openly IGNORE laws and aren’t punished!
It is a going to get worse!
I am not sure Professor Turley is correct in his appraisal of the new ethics guidelines. We have often been told by conservative leaders that the antidote to false speech is more speech. The examples Turley gives surely make his point. They also portray their authors as bigots, biased, or just plain stupid.
Almost half the founders were lawyers or legal professionals. Half the members of the Senate today are lawyers, and a third of the House members are skilled in the law. With apologies to Judge Howell, the only myth here worth discussing is the one that says judges are not politicians. If this were true, there would be no judges.
Our long history of dealing with bias has taught us how to effectively avoid it and, when that doesn’t work, to effectively overcome it. As potential defendants or plaintiffs, each of us deserves to know whether the judge who has been chosen to review our case is biased, and, if so, there are lawful means permitting us to demand a different judge.
If the rules of judicial ethics prohibited judges from informing the public of their biases, we might be victimized by them and left to wonder what might have been had we only known beforehand, that is, before we trusted them. A better proposal might allow for a formal procedure to permit one to force recusal on the basis of political bias. Now, recusal is left up to the judges themselves who, of course, never see themselves as biased. We might consider tinkering with this idea a bit, although we have to be very careful, lest we create something that’s worse than what we have.
At some point they’ll cross a line and then congress should then introduce strict rules to act like unbiased judges, those who don’t, impeach them and ban them.
Roberts failed us all, failed the USA and democracy.
LOL…who…the RINO light-weights who do nothing?
A good example of a stupid commenter.
Well tempered writing. That said, I have been one to call for the removal of Judges that clearly and purposefully ignore, violate or usurp the Constitution and its Supreme Court mandates. It is now clear the Judicial Branch is in the process of overthrowing the other two branches of government. I again call for sanctions for any Judge that is over ruled by an appellate court on violations of the Constitution and investigations of willful disregard for Case Law and Supreme Court rulings. Any refusal by a Judge to recuse themselves based on a provable appearance of bias/conflict must result in stiff financial penalties for those Judges. It is time the Federal Judiciary get back in it’s lane of non-bias arbiters of fact. This movement by this governing body of the Judiciary proves they are way out of their Lane!
Trump has been ignoring courts for a while. The courts have no enforcement ability; that is up to the Executive branch. If you think the courts are over-reaching it is the Executive branch that closes the fingers.
The problem of biased judges is controlled by appeals. If the evidence supplied is counter to whatever the judge does, the appeals process will reflect that. It looks bad to have a large number of appeals on the basis of courtroom behavior and so the most biased judges should be on the lookout to monitor their own behavior to avoid that bias from entering the result. It doesn’t matter if the judge issues their personal opinion, it matters what their findings are.
I’d rather go after the judges who use weak sentences on sexual predators and rapists, but it appears this administration is supportive of weak responses to those crimes. Unless an immigrant does it and then it’s a bigger deal. But college athlete with a shot at the pros? Time served and 2 months probation.
Judges have one job. To rule on the law and merits of case. They are not to wade into politics and this has been from the start. Does anyone truly think this is good to have judges make political comments and then rule in a case? You want to undermine the credibility of the court, let the people think judges are ruling on the politics as compared to the law.
I get President Trump is one of most irritating politicians in many years and he gets under the skin of everyone. That’s what he does, but when judges react with public comments, they need to recuse themselves or step away from the bench. That goes for both Democrat and Republican appointed judges.
Typically a judge will include a rationale for the ruling. You can examine that work product and see if you agree or disagree with the reasoning.
I’m sure there were judges who were angry at having to return run-away slaves to their owners and still ruled to do it. There were probably judges who wanted the Jews released rather that going to death camps, but still ruled to do it
It is possible to follow the law and precedents and still be outraged at the result.