Stripped of Justice: The Aftermath

I’ll be extensively discussing the deaths of Farrah Fawcett and Michael Jackson, assessing their impact on our society, and looking forward to what rising stars in their respective fields could possibly rise to inherit the gargantuan influence of these departed cultural titans. If there’s the time, hopefully I can briefly touch on the rising  (in popularity) yet falling (in stability) marital meltdown that is Jon and Kate Plus 8.

……just kidding. Yeah, this is never going to be a pop culture blog. Also, how am I supposed to care about some celebrity deaths and a reality show kerfuffle when there’s Supreme Court news to be had? That’s right, the nine biggest celebrities in the land are driving the news cycle today! The case of Safford United School District v. Redding has been decided, and much to my (pleasant) surprise, the Court held in favor of Redding, 8-1. Unanimous save for the lone vote of one Clarence Thomas–I’ll get to him shortly. As a recap, Savana Redding was a 13-year old student who was strip searched in school for ibuprofen. See here for more background. During oral arguments, it seemed distressingly likely that the Court would decide in favor of the school district. Justice Stephen Breyer saw the search as no more traumatic than changing for gym class, and even David Souter (usually on the liberal side of the Court) sounded more concerned about the possibility of illegal drug use instead of the invasiveness of the search. In looking at the questions asked of the lawyer for the school district, I was hard-pressed to find anyone other than Ruth Bader Ginsburg who acted disturbed by the search. Perhaps Ginsburg made a compelling argument to her colleagues in the interim, as almost all of the Justices agreed that the search was unconstitutional. Interestingly, this was the first school-based case decided by the Supreme Court in many years that did not simply side with the school district’s actions due to (what I see as an unrealistically powerful) fear of substance abuse by students. In my opinion, a good call!

On to Justice Thomas! I read in one blog that the writer liked to skip the majority decisions and go straight to Clarence Thomas’s dissents (if there is one). The blogger stated that it was akin to skipping to ice cream during a meal, which is accurate to a point. I would modify the analogy thusly: it’s just like eating ice cream, except that the ice cream is two heaping scoops of delusion-chip cookie dough topped with hallucinogenic sauce. I was pondering Thomas’s opinion, and wondered if the 4th Amendment ran over his dog and set his house on fire, since searches and seizures shouldn’t ever be limited in his book. Well, that’s unfair, really. Thomas only thinks that *schoolchildren* should have no rights. He essentially stated in another case that he felt schoolchildren have no rights once they enter school grounds, equating them with prisoners as far as privacy goes. Thankfully, nobody else in the Court (including all the other conservatives) thought that he was on the right track.

I could arguably go on for hours picking apart the ridiculous arguments made by Thomas, but I’ll only address one. Thomas states that the Court shouldn’t try to create any rule regarding strip searches since that should be handled on a district by district basis without the “interference” of the Court. So, the Court shouldn’t rule against an eminently harmful and invasive act because it should be left up to individual groups and communities? Look, I understand that some things should be left up to individual states or smaller groups (like raising revenue through whatever types of taxes or schemes deemed necessary on a state/local level), but relying on a school-district-by-school-district push against overzealous search policies is extreme. Besides, the Court needed to set a bright line stating that schools should have to abide by the rule that searches must be both justified and reasonable in scope (and the strip search of Redding was neither) On a side note, I find it interesting that George H. W. Bush stated that he felt Clarence Thomas was an “empathetic” judge. I really have to wonder if Thomas would recognize empathy if it smacked him clear across the face. But I digress. I’ll have to tackle empathy on another day.

For now, way to go, SCOTUS! You have restored my faith for the time being.

-Josh

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