The Angry Judge: Samuel Alito

In one of the longest articles I can remember, The New Yorker tries to understand Alito. What draws the author into Alito's head is not that he voted to overturn Roe. It is the bitter and sarcastic writing he penned in the decision. He is not a man fascinated with the law. He is a man out to slay his enemies.

He has what are peculiar ways of weaponizing the law toward carrying out his revenge. In the long Dodds decision (overturning Roe) he finally reveals why the fetus is a human being. It is because the Mississippi legislature and Governor thinks it is a human being. That is, Alito himself thinks the fetus is a human being and this makes it a fact. Any other version of when life begins belongs to his enemies. It's his version of objective jurisprudence. 

A former friend and classmate of Alito said she grew up in a middle-class Catholic Church and neighborhood like Alito. The difference between them, she said, was that he never left his parents' and his church's beliefs. He is still back there. The rest of their circle moved on.

Justice Sonya Sotomayor said in her minority Dobbs decision, "The significance of today's opinion will be decided in the future. The law often has a way of evolving without regard to original intensions--a way of actually following where logic leads." 

The intention of Dobbs was to substantially reduce abortions. If it reduces them only a bit, it seems to me the public will have decided what the law of the land for abortions should be. The Supreme Court majority may be ignored. 

Alito's decision says that while the court is reversing Roe, other principles decided by past courts will continue to stand. The one of most interest is Lovings, one of the great cases which made interracial marriage legal. Alito's statement seems childish. How does he know reversing Roe will not result in reversing Loving. There is a political constituency today that wants Loving reversed just as there is one which wanted Roe reversed. No one should base a law on such a ridiculous premise.

Alito hates it that U.S. society is becoming more diverse and secular. He is trying to stop this change.