Alito says Congress lacks authority to regulate US Supreme Court -WSJ
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[July 29, 2023]
By John Kruzel
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Conservative U.S. Supreme Court Justice Samuel
Alito said that Congress lacks the power to regulate the court, in an
interview published by the Wall Street Journal on Friday a week after
Senate Democrats advanced a bill to impose an ethics code.
The Democratic-controlled Senate Judiciary Committee last week approved
the bill, which would mandate a binding code for the court following
revelations that some justices - including Alito - had failed to
disclose luxury trips funded by wealthy benefactors.
"I know this is a controversial view, but I'm willing to say it," Alito
said in the interview published in the Journal's opinion section. "No
provision in the Constitution gives them the authority to regulate the
Supreme Court — period."
Alito's view was shared by some Senate Republicans who last week cited
the U.S. Constitution's division of powers among the government's
executive, legislative and judicial branches in opposing the
ethics-reform measure. That bill, which cleared the committee on an
11-10 party-line vote, is unlikely to gain the Republican support needed
to pass Congress.
Alito also commented on the judicial approaches of some of his
colleagues on the court's 6-3 conservative majority, including Chief
Justice John Roberts and Justices Neil Gorsuch and Clarence Thomas.
The court has drawn criticism from liberals and praise from
conservatives in its past two terms for sweeping decisions including
ending the nationwide right to abortion and banning college affirmative
action.
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The U.S. Supreme Court is seen as
justices returned to the high court for the first time since the
leak of a draft majority opinion written by Justice Samuel Alito
preparing for a majority of the court to overturn the landmark Roe
v. Wade abortion rights decision later this year, in Washington,
U.S., May 12, 2022. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque/File Photo
The Journal's editorial page in June drew criticism for allowing
Alito to preemptively try to defend his failure to disclose a 2008
trip to Alaska on a private jet belonging to a billionaire hedge
fund manager whose business interests have come before the court.
Details of Alito's trip were revealed by ProPublica, which also
exposed decades-long ties between Thomas and billionaire Republican
donor Harlan Crow.
The recent reporting has helped to rally Democrats around a bill by
Democratic Senator Sheldon Whitehouse that would impose on the top
U.S. judicial body new requirements for financial disclosures and
for recusal from cases in which a justice may have a conflict of
interest.
Unlike other members of the federal judiciary, the Supreme Court's
nine life-tenured justices have no binding ethics code of conduct,
though they are subject to financial disclosure laws. The justices
also decide for themselves whether to step aside from cases
involving a possible conflict of interest.
(Reporting by John Kruzel, additional reporting by Andrew Chung;
Editing by Scott Malone and Alistair Bell)
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