The Brethren

The cold front has hit.

For Houston, that means the weather is down in the 70s. Last night was down in the 50s - we closed the windows. Some of my neighbors told me they have never, ever opened the windows in their house. Unbelievable - it is beautiful here. They either run heat or the AC; me, I would rather open the windows on a nice day. Maybe it's my love of fresh air; maybe it's my desire not to use energy needlessly. No wonder people living in the burbs have such a huge carbon footprint.

Antonin Scalia is all over the news these days. He has a book so he has broken his silence and is granting interviews. Interesting guy. I am a secret Supreme Court junkie; I have found the court and its processes fascinating ever since taking Com Law in J School. I probably could have handled law school after that class - it was all about memorizing precedents and citing them on exams. Except that after getting a law degree one is generally required to become an attorney, which didn't interest me so much. I would have clerked for a Supreme Court justice, but as for practicing law, not so much.

But I digress. I have heard three interviews and read one with Scalia since yesterday. And he is nothing if not consistent. I am not always his biggest fan - he is much, much too conservative for my taste - but he is thoughtful and a constitutional scholar. He will not support certain laws because these issues were not specifically dealt with in the Constitution. He considers himself an "originalist," meaning nothing can be inferred if not written. So don't look for rulings on gay marriage, abortion or net neutrality - he won't uphold them, either for or against.

He is against what he sees as an "activist" court. But if the court's duty is only to uphold what is laid out verbatim in the Constitution, then their purpose is very narrow; how do we deal with an ever-changing and more complicated society? We can't have a loose patchwork of 50 radically different states with no common jurisprudence.

I just can't agree with him in all situations. Scalia considers the Constitution dead - if it ain't in there, you won't find it. I think the founders did consider the document able to evolve - why leave open the option to amend it? But I do respect his philosophy, particularly since he is consistent.

This is my biggest contention with some political ideologies. I don't consider myself a Libertarian, but I certainly respect the point of view. But I don't understand how one be one can be all for protecting life in the case of abortion yet support the death penalty - feels like a contradiction.

But aren't we all just a bundle of competing ideas - I don't imagine any of us is completely consistent all the time. (Just ask my children ... )

Mostly, this peek into the mind of Scalia has given me a new appreciation for how he interprets the Constitution - a genius of a document, perhaps the most brilliant ever written in my opinion. And I love knowing that he rails equally on all his colleagues - from John Roberts to David Souter to John Paul Stevens. And his best friend on the court? Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

I'll add his book to my reading list. Always good to have a little something to think about.