Politics

Now Clarence Thomas Holds All the Cards

“What’s interesting about that, is, in addition to his obvious monumental tectonic effect on American law, he’s also at the peak of his power inside the court,” the Axios co-founder stated. “So Clarence Thomas is playing the long game. That is, if you take his opinions and his dissents together, they’re not random points about particular cases.”

“Over the years, he’s formed what Sam Baker at Axios calls his own body of law; his own precedence,” he continued. “Except it is one man, one justice speaking for himself. Here’s an incredible fact in Sam Baker’s story. That is, in the one person abortion comments that Thomas made, he cited 11 of his own precedents.”

“Here’s another quirk about his muscle inside the court,” he elaborated. “The senior justice, the longest-serving justice on the winning side gets to assign the writing of the opinion. Thomas can assign — if Chief Justice Roberts is not in the majority — Clarence Thomas can assign it to himself, or he can assign it to whichever justice he thinks would most likely reflect his views but also keep the majority.” Read more…

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