Asides

Supreme Court reports/retorts

By J. L. Bastiat ⋅ June 30, 2008 ⋅  Email This Post ⋅  Print This Post ⋅ Post a comment

Jonathan Adler has a little dose of reality for us, asking Is This Still a “Conservative Court”?

After one more Supreme Court term, it’s clear that many spoke too soon. Sure, conservatives are cheering the Heller decision, but how “conservative” is a Court that invalidates the death penalty for child rape and declares that non-citizen detainees held outside U.S. sovereign territory by the military have a constitutional right to bring habeas actions in federal court, despite federal legislation to the contrary?

Viewed as a whole, this term saw a Court that often defied easy ideological characterization. There were relatively few 5-4 splits, particularly compared to OT2006, and many 5-4 divisions along untraditional lines. Overall, it was a Court term that defied the “conservative ascendancy” narrative.