Justice from the South Side
Fair Courts E-lert
Bibliographic Info:
Author: James Oliphant
Source: The Chicago Tribune
Date: 10/20/2008
Article reports that if Senator Barack Obama is elected to the presidency next month, "it's entirely possible" that U.S. Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens "could finally retire and allow Obama to choose his successor." Noting Stevens' long tenure on the high court, article asserts that his "departure would also offer Obama the opportunity to slow, if not reverse, the court's conservative drift by replacing an aging member of the court's liberal wing with a fresh face poised to do battle with such justices as John Roberts and Samuel Alito." Although some observers say that Stevens "is unlikely to let the political climate determine when to leave the bench," Joseph Thai, a former clerk of Stevens, said that Stevens' dissent in Bush v. Gore may have made Stevens "more concerned with outlasting Bush that what he does after a new president takes office."