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Follow on Google News | Justice Scalia Reverse Benchslapped in New York Times Over Support For Sex Segregation"Benchslapping" has been turned around in a scathing piece in the New York Times in which Justice "Nino Scalia" is castigated for "poking his nose in a local legal wrangle" involving Catholic U's sex-segregated dorms which might come before him.
The irony is that, at least once before, Scalia was reportedly forced to recuse himself from a case before the high court because of very general comments he had made about the issue. Here is comment appears directed at a very specific legal proceeding. Others joining in reverse benchslapping the controversial Supreme Court justice, or at least commenting on his very unusual tactic of publicly pre-judging a pending legal proceeding include: ** AMERICAN'S UNITED FOR SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE: "Impaired Judgment: Justice Scalia Just Doesn't Know When to Stop Talking" http://blog.au.org/ ** WALL STREET JOURNAL: "Justice Scalia Takes Sides in Same-Sex Dorm Dispute" http://blogs.wsj.com/ ** HUFFINGTON POST: "Catholic University Same-Sex Dorms: Antonin Scalia Expresses Support Against John Banzhaf Lawsuit" http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ ** DCIST.COM: "Scalia Sides With Segregated Dorms at Catholic" http://dcist.com/ ** ABA JOURNAL: "Scalia Defends Moral Judgment and Law Schools That Embrace It" http://www.abajournal.com/ Dowd was very critical of Scalia's "latest supreme lapse of judgment," calling it "operatically imprudent." Americans United said: "Finally, I note that Scalia went off on a tear about a controversy at Catholic University in Washington, D.C., where a D.C. resident is suing over the school’s new ban on coed dorms, claiming it violates D.C.’s Human Rights Act. This case is pending in the courts, and the man who brought it, George Washington University Law School Professor John Banzhaf, told the Wall Street Journal he was 'astonished that a justice of the nation’s highest court would single out and pre-judge a legal proceeding which could set an important precedent, and could one day even come before the U.S. Supreme Court.' Banzhaf is right – and Scalia ought to know better. In 2003, Scalia has to recuse himself from a case challenging 'under God' in the Pledge of Allegiance because he had earlier given a speech to a Knights of Columbus rally in Virginia during which he asserted that the Framers of the Constitution didn’t intend to 'exclude God from the public forums and from political life.' When is this guy going to learn to keep his mouth shut?" Banzhaf says that although Catholic University has repeatedly stated that its reasons for segregating its dorms were secular and not religious, and has never pointed to any specific Catholic prohibition on coed dorms nor explained why it and so many other Catholic colleges and universities have had them for many years, this proceeding is being taken very seriously because it could have major implications for Catholic universities and for other Catholic institutions. "At the very least, when a U.S. Supreme Court Justice, the Archbishopric of Washington (which called me a 'neo-pagan') JOHN F. BANZHAF III, B.S.E.E., J.D., Sc.D. Professor of Public Interest Law George Washington University Law School, FAMRI Dr. William Cahan Distinguished Professor, Fellow, World Technology Network, Founder, Action on Smoking and Health (ASH) Creator, Banzhaf Index of Voting Power 2000 H Street, NW, Suite S402 Washington, DC 20052, USA (202) 994-7229 // (703) 527-8418 http://banzhaf.net/ # # # John F. Banzhaf III is a Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University Law School [http://banzhaf.net/] End
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