WHEN Charles Grassley, chair of the Senate judiciary committee, said in the spring that he expected an imminent Supreme Court vacancy, all eyes turned to Anthony Kennedy. The 81-year-old native Californian, appointed by Ronald Reagan in 1988, is the court’s longest-serving member. He is also the median justice on a court often riven between four conservatives and four liberals on hot-button questions. At a reunion of his law clerks in June, Justice Kennedy widened everyone’s eyes when he said “there has been a lot of speculation about a certain announcement from me” before declaring with a wink that the bar was staying open late. The teasing may have fooled Mr Grassley for a time, but the Iowa senator is changing his tune. “Evidently”, he told Reuters last week, the Supreme Court vacancy is “not going to happen”.
Why is Justice Kennedy hanging around for another year? Maybe he would like to put in a full three decades before hanging up his robe. Maybe he isn’t anxious to give Donald Trump an opportunity to replace...Continue reading
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