Ooops, They Did It Again: Supreme Court Justices Commentaries

At International Law Convention, Justice Kennedy Focuses on Genocide

Coming from a justice that has criticized the use of international precedents for establishing a metric, criteria or comparison of human decency, these words are somewhat contradictory, hypocritical and self-serving.

At its last four annual conventions, the American Society of International Law has hosted what has amounted to a long-running debate among Supreme Court justices over the use of foreign and international law in their decisionmaking.

On Thursday, Justice Anthony Kennedy, who has been a lightning rod in the debate, addressed the convention and barely mentioned the issue, preferring instead to focus on the topic of genocide ­-- and how lawyers have a responsibility to work against it.

"It is the duty of the world to do more than watch," said Kennedy at the meeting in Washington, D.C., referring to the ongoing genocide in western Sudan's Darfur region. The justice, indicating he has embarked on a personal study of genocide, lamented the fact that the massacre of 800,000 people in Rwanda a dozen years ago "happened on our watch." He called on international lawyers to hold nations and international organizations to account as a way to prevent such conduct in the future.

The convention marked the 100th anniversary of the association, which indicated its commitment to the importance of international law by issuing a booklet titled, "International Law: 100 Ways it Shapes our Lives."

At its recent conventions, Justices Stephen Breyer, Sandra Day O'Connor and Ruth Bader Ginsburg defended the use of international law as a resource -- though not as the foundation -- for Court decisions. In 2004, Justice Antonin Scalia came to the association to offer a counterpoint, asserting that international law was "never relevant" to the interpretation of the U.S. Constitution.

Justice Scalia: Boston Herald Staff Watches Too Much 'Sopranos'

While Scalia may criticize other justices for referencing international law and/or the law of other nations to set precedents, metrics and comparisons, he seems to not hesitate to draw upon such important references as the Sopranos, a popular HBO drama series based on mobsters and mob culture... Maybe Scalia watches it because the depicted characters are of Italian descent? Regardless, the gesture he made was a well-known obscenity in East Boston and was usually accompanied with the Italian version of the "F word".

Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, in a scathing letter to the editor of the Boston Herald, accused the newspaper's staff of watching "too many episodes of the Sopranos" for interpreting a hand gesture he made at a cathedral as obscene.

The Boston Herald reported Monday the justice made "an obscene gesture, flicking his hand under his chin" in response to a question about whether lawyers might question his impartiality in matters of church and state. The incident occurred after he attended Mass at the Cathedral of the Holy Cross.

But Scalia said in his letter the gesture is not obscene at all, but dismissive. Scalia said he had explained the gesture's meaning to no avail to the reporter, whom he referred to as "an up-and-coming 'gotcha' star."

To back his interpretation of the gesture, Scalia in his letter quoted from Luigi Barzini's book, "The Italians": "The extended fingers of one hand moving slowly back and forth under the raised chin means 'I couldn't care less. It's no business of mine. Count me out.'"

Scalia said in the letter, written to Executive Editor Kenneth Chandler, that the reporter leapt to conclusions that it was offensive because he initially explained his gesture by saying, "That's Sicilian."

"From watching too many episodes of the Sopranos, your staff seems to have acquired the belief that any Sicilian gesture is obscene -- especially when made by an 'Italian jurist.' (I am, by the way, an American jurist.),'' he wrote, referring to the American television series about a fictional mob boss and his family.

The Herald had referred to him as an "Italian-American jurist."

By the way, Antonin Scalia has referred to himself in the past as an "Italian-American" and as a "Sicilian" on previous occasions... just ask his family. While being of Italian/Sicilian descent is not even relative to the issue at hand, the obscene gesture seems to be something that runs rampant among high-mucky-muck Republicans: George W., Dick Cheney and Antonin Scalia all seem prone to swearing or displaying obscene gestures in public... So much for those "family values" and "Christian perspectives" they have claimed. Fortunately, Scalia is Catholic and can go to confession.