Today in Supreme Court History: October 23, 1991

10/23/1991: Justice Clarence Thomas takes oath.

Justice Clarence Thomas

Comments

[AmosArch]

A great justice but also great at exposing the true face of certain people as they devolve into cartoon stereotypical racists at the sight of a black man who doesn't conform to the ideological position he is supposed to according to the media.

[Frank Drackman]

Ironic that the Media Bee-otch who hoped "His wife feeds him lots of pork and bacon so he dies" herself died of a Heart Attack.

Frank

[JoeFromtheBronx]

A black conservative is quite reasonable as a concept and reflected in how religion plays a major part in the lives of many black people.

Clarence Thomas receives criticism based on various things. Just focusing on him as an individual, people have many criticisms.

What he is "supposed" to do is not commit sexual harassment and lie about it. He is supposed to follow basic judicial ethics. He should have more respect for stare decisis. His originalism and judicial analysis are generally open to criticism overall.

Even Scalia at times thought he went too far.

His long period of no questions at all (not occasional questioning, some of which were quite worthwhile) was overkill.

More than one moderate/liberal in blog comments has noted Thomas writes many good majority opinions (as a matter of clarity and so on, putting aside the merits), often in boring-sounding cases that are the meat of their docket.

On a personal level, many have noted he is a lovely colleague and boss, including engaging with staff (knowing their names and so on). Still is ethically challenged and should have resigned.

[Frank Drackman]

Clarence Thomas did not have sex with that woman, Mizzzzzz Hill!!!!
Or leave a young woman to asphyxiate (not drowned, there's a difference) like a certain Dead Kennedy did, and continued to serve in the Senate for 40 more years.
Seriously, you should change your Nom de Guerre to "Joe Shit the Ragman" for all the worthwhile content your comments have.

Frank

[The Margrave of Azilia]

"Still is ethically challenged and should have resigned."

I like your phrasing. He can still resign, but you'd be less interested in him doing that now. You'd like him to resign when a Democrat can appoint his successor.

"He should have more respect for stare decisis."

Why? Many of those precedents come from eras when the Court had no Black representation.

And do you claim that he has less respect for precedent than, say, William Brennan did? (Of course, Brennan only overruled the *bad* precedents.)