25 Years After Thomas Joins Supreme Court, a Friend Hails an American Originalist
Not every justice on the Supreme Court connects the “magical words” of the Declaration of Independence with the government structure set up in the Constitution to protect natural rights as expressed by Thomas Jefferson.
In fact, the only one to do so with any consistency in recent years is Justice Clarence Thomas, a friend and former White House lawyer said in an interview with The Daily Signal on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of Thomas’s swearing-in.
“What we now have after Thomas has served for 25 years on the court is not just an amazing and inspiring life story, but a remarkable record of jurisprudence,” recalled Mark Paoletta, who was on the White House legal team when President George H.W. Bush nominated Thomas to the high court.
Other judges have produced “originalist” decisions, Paoletta said, but Thomas stands out as the one most willing to challenge prior court decisions that in his view conflict with constitutional rights, some of them lost to history and calling out for restoration:
Thomas is the one justice who is most willing to look back to the Declaration of Independence as the lodestar of our constitutional structure and how this leads into the concept of federalism, the separation …read more