A Call To Action

Those activist conservative judges
by kos
Mon Oct 31, 2005 at 04:00:39 PM PDT

So what are activist judges? Wouldn't the obvious definition be judges who strike down congressional laws? I mean, telling Congress they can't do something is a pretty balsy move.

So which judges are the most activist?

We found that justices vary widely in their inclination to strike down Congressional laws. Justice Clarence Thomas, appointed by President George H. W. Bush, was the most inclined, voting to invalidate 65.63 percent of those laws; Justice Stephen Breyer, appointed by President Bill Clinton, was the least, voting to invalidate 28.13 percent. The tally for all the justices appears below.

Thomas 65.63 %
Kennedy 64.06 %
Scalia 56.25 %
Rehnquist 46.88 %
O'Connor 46.77 %
Souter 42.19 %
Stevens 39.34 %
Ginsburg 39.06 %
Breyer 28.13 %

To those who aren't well versed in the personalities of the Supreme Court -- the first five on the list are conservative judges, Souter is a Republican-nominated moderate judge, and the bottom three are liberal judges. Funny how it's worked out that way. As Atrios says:

I understand that political spinners are going to do what they do, but when the supposedly responsible members of our press are reducing everything to buzzwords and catchphrases they should at least define what they mean. With Alito it's just ridiculous to claim he's a practitioner of "judicial restraint."

Judicial Activism usually means nothing more than "Judgifying I don't like." In other words, it means nothing.