There is a very interesting tea leaf reading piece by a former SCOTUS Law Clerk over at NRO.
Mr. Whelan notes that Justices usually read only one dissent from the bench during a single term. Justice Scalia read his dissent in the Arizona case. If Scalia was not in the majority in Obamacare, he would likely be the senior Justice in dissent, which would give him first dibbs on writing the dissent. So it is a good guess that Scalia is in the majority on Obamacare.
Additionally, Justice Roberts has not delivered a majority opinion from the March and April sittings and he has delivered fewer majority opinions than the other Justices. It seems that Roberts may be delivering the majority opinion.
3 comments:
I was wondering what you thought about that but I got busy and forgot to send it to you.
Of course - all that would be moot if (like you suggested was still possible) there is no Obamacare ruling this term after all.
I really have no reason to believe that the opininion will not be delivered tomorrow, except that it seems such a big case that the Court may break with convention in the way it is delivered.
They have already threw out the playbook several times on this case. I have not read the Arizona case, but by most accounts it is not a paragon of clarity. So it seems that the Obamacare opinion is taking all sorts of oxygen from a limited supply.
It would not surprise me if the Justice took a few extra days to deliver it.
I don't think they will hold it over for the next term.
Well if this goes the way I (and pretty much everyone I ask) expects tomorrow, then there is going to be some truly historic gnashing of liberal teeth and rending of liberal garments tomorrow. That guy from Wisconsin who thought Democracy had ended after their Walker recall recall failure will be nothing compared to what the rest of liberal-dom chokes up for lunch tomorrow.
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