Another 5-4 decision

In its Caperton v. A. T. Massey Coal Co. decision, the Supreme Court ruled today that "elected judges must disqualify themselves from cases involving people who spent exceptionally large sums to put them on the bench." [Source]

The case arose from a dispute between West Virginia coal mining companies. In 2002 a jury found that Massey ran Caperton out of business through fraud, and awarded $50 million. In 2004 the chief justice of West Virginia's Supreme Court, Warren R. McGraw, lost his reelection bid in part because Massey spent $3 million in support of his opponent, Brent Benjamin (pictured here).

Benjamin won by seven percentage points, and on appeal by Massey he refused to recuse himself. His reasoning: "he found nothing showing bias for or against any litigant." [Source] The state Supreme Court ruled in favor of Massey and reversed the lower court's decision.

My problem with the U.S. Supreme Court is not that it made the wrong decision; I take issue with the fact it was split 5-4, and that those dissenting made some dumb arguments.

Justices Roberts, Alito, Scalia, and Thomas in essence said that while Benjamin was a bad apple, "the cure is worse than the disease." Their argument is that by trying to regulate recusals you'd "erode public confidence in an impartial judiciary" even more than "an isolated failure to recuse." Scalia went further and derided the court's "quixotic quest to right all wrongs and repair all imperfections through the Constitution." He felt, "we do more good than harm by seeking to correct this imperfection through expansion of our constitutional mandate in a manner ungoverned by any discernible rule."[Source]

This is pretty silly. When a child does something wrong, and everyone already knows it, you make sure the whole class knows that's not acceptable. You don't just let it slide in the hope it's just "an isolated case."

For his part, Scalia doesn't seem to understand why he's there. Dude, you're a JUDGE. Your job is to right wrongs and repair imperfections. People don't come to you for direction; they want justice. And what's this "expansion of our constitutional mandate" garbage? Your constitutional mandate is "all Cases ... arising under this Constitution." Is that argument really worth a dissenting vote on a case involving potential judicial corruption?

As for Thomas, I don't expect any meaningful discussion about recusal to ever come out of his mouth. His refusal to recuse himself in Bush v. Gore, despite his wife's involvement in Bush's campaign, settled that issue for me.

What really undermines the public confidence is the way the court produces 5-4 split decisions with reckless abandon. Heck, Roe v. Wade was a 7-2, and there nothing much more controversial than that. The Supreme Court needs to get its act together and form more consensus opinions.