Clarence Thomas generally keeps quiet after court decisions. Now we see why..........

[marmar]

WASHINGTON -- Justice Antonin Scalia may have penned the most colorful dissent to Friday's landmark Supreme Court ruling on marriage equality, but his colleague Clarence Thomas wrote the weirdest.

Thomas, alone among the four dissenting justices, seemed to recognize that the legal reasoning he and his fellow conservatives were bringing to bear on same-sex marriage could also apply to interracial marriage. That's a problem for Thomas, because only bigots oppose interracial marriage, and he presumably didn't want his dissent to be seen as window-dressing for hatred. Thomas tried to get around this uncomfortable parallel by arguing that Loving v. Virginia, the 1967 decision that required every state to recognize interracial marriage, wasn't really about marriage after all. Here's what he wrote:

Petitioners’ misconception of liberty carries over into their discussion of our precedents identifying a right to marry, not one of which has expanded the concept of “liberty” beyond the concept of negative liberty. Those precedents all involved absolute prohibitions on private actions associated with marriage. Loving v. Virginia, 388 U. S. 1 (1967), for example, involved a couple who was criminally prosecuted for marrying in the District of Columbia and cohabiting in Virginia, id., at 2–3. They were each sentenced to a year of imprisonment, suspended for a term of 25 years on the condition that they not reenter the Commonwealth together during that time.

.....(snip).....

Human dignity cannot be taken away by the government. Slaves did not lose their dignity (any more than they lost their humanity) because the government allowed them to be enslaved. Those held in internment camps did not lose their dignity because the government confined them. And those denied governmental benefits certainly do not lose their dignity because the government denies them those benefits. The government cannot bestow dignity, and it cannot take it away.

................(more)

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/06/26/clarence-thomas-gay-marriage_n_7672858.html?ncid=fcbklnkushpmg00000013

[marym625]

1. I have been asking this since yesterday,

How they would justify or argue against the Loving decision. In fact I just posted that question on another post about Scalia.

They're all nuts

[LondonReign2]

6. Scalia, in particular, is no longer really a judge

He feigns consistency but is quite the opposite, contradicting even his own previous decisions in his twisted rationalizations for his desired partisan outcomes. It's a lifetime appointment and he no longer gives a flying fuck about the law, he merely wants to wield his power to shape the country in his own vile image and he knows there is nothing anyone can do about it. I think that is why he becomes so unhinged when he loses a decision -- someone is actually curtailing his unbridled power and it sends him into a furious rage.

[marym625]

7. yep.

I really do wonder if he is suffering from some type of dementia. With him, it could go unnoticed for a while.

[Raster]

9. Yes, some kind of dementia: opus dei dementia.

Fat Tony is a disgrace to the bench and along with Thomas and Roberts should have NEVER been appointed.

[marym625]

12. couldn't agree more. eom.

[FlatBaroque]

20. Opus Deimentia

[Raster]

34. Ding! Winnah!

[valerief]

17. Yeah, wallet dementia. He does what big money pays him to do. nt

[marym625]

19. LOL!

That's a new one. But I think it's very contagious. We better stop that one right away!

[yardwork]

14. Scalia is truly homophobic. His earlier decisions were all about his personal feelings about sodomy.

He can't get over the sex. Scalia is not well. He has issues. Hang ups.

[AwakeAtLast]

30. He doth protest too much

Makes one wonder, hmmmm........

[yardwork]

31. I don't get that vibe. It's because of Opus Dei, imo

[KoKo]

15. ....!

[NYC Liberal]

24. And the irony is that's exactly what he accuses the other ones of doing.

Projection at its finest.

[sorechasm]

8. Very simply: they oppose or defend at the whim of their 'sponsers'

That is the only justification I can find why he is defending his position so awkwardly. I don't understand Thomas' argument. Is he stating that slavery is somehow 'dignified'?

[marym625]

11. got me.

It doesn't make sense. Like a blithering idiot wrote it

[CincyDem]

2. Spoken like a man with no dignity.

to be clear - referencing Clarence, certainly not the #1 poster.

[hobbit709]

3. "Better to be thought a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt."

When Clarence speaks he proves that statement every time.

[GoneOffShore]

5. You beat me to it by a minute!

Curse you, Red Baron!

[GoneOffShore]

4. Sometimes it's better to be quiet and thought a fool

Than to speak and prove it.
(Paraphrasing someone else)

[Fairgo]

10. Professor Irwin Corey writes his briefs

soft headed gobbledygook

[randr]

13. While Black Americans regained their dignity and humanity

slave owners and their supporters lost their dignity and humanity forever.

[heaven05]

27. +1000

truth

[TBF]

16. Supreme court justices should not function as political hacks

and yet that is what we repeatedly get from Scalia and Thomas. It's embarrassing. I'm sure they'd love to overturn every decision made during the Warren Court years and set this country back by decades.

[Baitball Blogger]

18. Supreme Court Cray Thomas

Thanks for posting his legal reasoning. He is off the charts when it comes to understanding that inalienable rights for Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness are directly related to dignity issues.

[rurallib]

21. I was going to start a thread asking if Thomas were the most inconsequential

justice ever.

I am not that deep into SCOTUS history, but Thomas' record seems to be that of agreeing with almost no one on anything. I have heard he often writes dissents to point up some strange twist he sees on laws.

He has been a justice damn near 30 years and has almost nothing of value for that time.

[GoneOffShore]

22. R A T S

Seen in a comments section somewhere

A little re-ordering makes it clear:

Roberts Alito Thomas Scalia

R A T S

That's what they are.

And even that is giving rats a bad name!

[restorefreedom]

29. i agree that they are scum but it is unkind to the rats

domestic rats are actually loving, kind, and peaceful.

completely opposite of these haters.

but your point is well taken.

[cilla4progress]

23. Shame on the Presidents/s who appointed them!

Much like the selection of GWB for President, the true powers behind the bench must just look for tools, in coming up with these nominees. They should have never made it through the confirmation process.

[heaven05]

25. total waste

total waste. GWB's father showed extreme cynicism and hate toward POC in putting this.........decayed desolation called a human being on the Supreme Court. Especially as a replacement for someone as eloquent and principled as Justice Thurgood Marshall. Chimps father knew exactly the statement he was making.

[SoapBox]

26. Did I miss it anyplace in here, that Thomas IS in an interracial marriage...

I almost had forgotten anout that, until a neighbor of mine reminded me.

[AwakeAtLast]

32. Yes

A GOP darling....

Is Ginni Thomas' Expanding Activism a Problem for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas? | Mother Jones
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/07/ginni-thomas-groundswell-conflict-interest

[PearliePoo2]

28. Clarence "what Tony said" Thomas is a know-nothing idiot.

He's an embarrassment and total disgrace to the bench.
Hang your head in shame H. W. Shame...shame...shame

[Scuba]

33. Thomas must be a graduate of the Sarah Palin School of Wordsmithing.