Justice Thomas

When I first started working as a cop the District Attorney had a bad habit of subpoenaing every person whose name appeared in the police report. It didn’t matter if that person had anything to do with the case. There was no pretrial conference, no way to be put on stand-by and no predicting in what order you may be called. So subpoenaed witnesses showed up at docket call and waited oftentimes for days for the call to be a witness, that never came. 

The courthouse was built in the 20’s and was mostly not air conditioned. Those offices that had air conditioning were not anxious to share it with outsiders. I discovered the law library had air conditioning, provided by the local bar association. So that was where I spent my time waiting for the witness call that never came. I spent all my time reading Supreme Court decisions, the whole thing: the unofficial summary, the majority opinion, opinions concurring with the majority, the dissent and any supporting opinions. I started out chasing search and seizure but my focus broadened and there was no telling where I might end up.

I recall that some Justices wrote clear opinions that went straight ahead and didn’t stray far from the line.  Others meandered and described a journey where several solutions were examined and found wanting in favor of the ultimate decision. I don’t recall any decisions that Justice William O Douglas authored, but I recall how scathing he could be dissent!

This all happened before Justice Thomas was on the court. I later told students, while teaching search and seizure, to read complete Supreme Court decisions. By reading the whole discussion the student would begin to understand the method to the madness, and that might be the highest level of understanding they could shoot for. But then I hadn’t read Justice Thomas-speaks-2.php

Follow the link to another link for a video interview of Justice Thomas. Get it from the horse’s mouth and decide based on what the man has to say who is lacking; Justice Thomas or the Main Stream Media.