If SCOTUS was doing it's job, there wouldn't be a swing vote.

[BR_Parkway]

Someone made that comment the other day, and it just stuck with me.

Everytime Senator So and So opens their mouth and claims that Justice XXX is a conservative or a liberal, then they're claiming that the Justice is failing to do their job, that they're deciding things for ideological purposes rather than on the facts of law.

Isn't it Congress' role to oversee that? To impeach a Justice who fails to do the job?

I don't know, there's an arguement in there that just resonates, but my brain can't seem to get it to my fingers this am.

[StClone]

1. Yeah, add to that the RW spin of making Law from the bench

If it were as easy as the Federalist Society claims there would be no swing votes due to interpretations differences just the enacting of the Constitution. Of course once we have a wacko SCUTOS the Corporations will have the final word with judges in lock-step.

[iamjoy]

2. More RW Bull, Don't Buy

SCOTUS can do its job and have swing votes.

A classic example (that helped me realize this) are two recent cases in which the voting was kind of flipped (I actually liked the "Conservative" justices ruling better)

1) Gonzales vs. Raich in which the Supreme Court ruled (6-3) that the federal government could block doctors from prescribing medical marijuana. Stevens wrote the majority opinion (I think he hinted that Congress could change the law). Renquist, Thomas & O'Connor dissented.

2) Kelo vs. City of New London (5-4)- local governments may force property owners to sell out and make way for private economic development when officials decide it would benefit the public. An interpretation, based on prior rulings going back (I believe) to the whole "just compensation"/"public use" clause of the Fifth Amendment. Renquist, Thomas, Scalia & O'Connor dissented.

So, just because a justice hands down a ruling you don't like is no reason to claim he/she is not performing his/her job. I do think idealogy has a place in determining whether or not a judge should get an appointment. Idealogy is not necessarily an opinion on a particular issue but a consitutional philosophy. Making it Conservative vs. Liberal is over simplifying the issue.