Terry H. Schwadron
May 20. 2024
Does Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito think he is absolving himself from the court’s own rules by blaming his wife, Martha-Ann Alito, for having flown an insurrectionist flag at him home with “no involvement whatsoever from him.”?
Does he think we’re all idiots is he just brazen in his refusal to own up to judicial ethics about political bias? Does he really believe that the flag incident from January 2021 makes him look like someone who can consider issues arising from the Jan. 6 Capitol riots for a Donald Trump usurpation of the presidency with anything related to a fair, unbiased, judicial view?
The questions arising from images published this week by The New York Times won’t quit. They won’t fade away, especially since the Supreme Court’s late decision to hear Trump’s claims of presidential immunity effectively have pushed the start of any federal trial beyond Election Day as a practical matter.
Alito is a stickler on the court for standing by rules, law and order, and original textual analysis — right up to the part where it affects him, his family, and the goals of his political party. He is even willing to sell out his wife to claim his own innocence — or naiveté.
By the court’s own rules — enforceable by no one outside the court itself — Alito should not be let anywhere near cases involving Jan. 6, Donald Trump’s candidacy and criminal counts, or even as a one of four required voted to even hear those Trump cases.
Alas, we learned again this week that Alito, whose scathing sarcasm and biting remarks during case hearings distinguish his presence, thinks the rules are for chumps. Or for liberal opponents.
Raising The Inverted Flag
Just to review, Alito told The Times that the insurrection symbol – an upside-down American flag was his wife’s idea meant as rebuke to a rude neighbor whose own lawn signs mocked Trump and cursed at Mrs. Alito. Alito told Fox his neighbors are ‘very political’ — apparently as opposed to themselves.
For openers, who besides Alito and now Sen. Bob Menendez, D-NJ, on trial for bribery, blames his own untoward behavior on his wife? What does this tell us about his character and judgment?
Even if Mrs. Alito, a former law librarian, displayed the flag without talking about it over morning coffee, did the judge not notice or object? Did he not recognize the connection to would-be Trump insurrectionists? Did he think that supporting the overturn of the government was an appropriate retort to the free speech of neighbors with whom he disagrees?
For that matter, does Alito suddenly support flying an upside-down flag symbol in violation of practices to maintain traditional respect for the national flag?
Or does he so regard his wife’s activities as having no influence over his own judicial image, as directed by court codes? Is he again like Justice Clarence Thomas who ignores the obvious conflict of interest with his wife’s calls to the White House to coordinate with coup plotters?
And did flying an insurrectionist flag persuade the rude neighbor from thinking crude thoughts about the Alitos?
Even at this late date, Alito should recuse himself from any decision in the presidential immunity claims before his court, but his arrogance won’t allow him to do so. Chief Justice John G Roberts Jr. should force the issue, but his timidity or fear of backlash won’t allow him to do so.
The Senate Judiciary Committee ought to step in, but despite some vocalizing, lacks the political heft to do so. Term limits for justices sound awfully tempting right about now.
Lowering Credibility and Trust
The Supreme Court is failing in public opinion, the consequence of precedent-upsetting decisions on abortions, guns, cutting federal power —almost all pulling in a partisan conservative manner— and personal ethics violations.
Thomas and Alito head the faction pursuing both the ideological bent and the ethical challenges.
Congress is failing for lack of governable majorities and for insistence on partisanship over service to the nation. The presidency is seen as failing to preserve democratic ways in quite different ways from those very partisans.
And the courts and the Justice Department increasingly come across as partisan super legislators even while hypocritically professing a hypocritically ivory tower approach based on finding new meaning in original text.
Our democracy is in trouble.
It doesn’t help when Alito tries to blame that on his wife.
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TerryHSchwadron 