The Oath (48 page)
Authors: Jeffrey Toobin
Justice Alito mouthed “not true” and shook his head as Obama described the consequences of the
Citizens United
decision during his 2010 State of the Union address. Justices (top row, from left) Alito, Sotomayor, (bottom row, from left) Roberts and Kennedy.
(photo credit i11)
After Elena Kagan’s Supreme Court nomination was announced in 2010,
The Wall Street Journal
ran this photograph of Kagan playing softball while she was a professor at the University of Chicago Law School. The
New York Post
reran the photo with a headline suggesting she was a lesbian.
(photo credit i12)
Obama’s second Supreme Court nominee, Elena Kagan, shown here with Obama and Chief Justice Roberts, takes her place as the 112th justice of the Supreme Court in 2010.
(photo credit i13)
From left to right, Sonia Sotomayor, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Elena Kagan. This is the first time in history that three women have served on the Supreme Court at the same time.
(photo credit i14)
President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton share a victory hug after the House of Representatives voted to pass health care reform in March 2010.
(photo credit i15)
Virginia Thomas, wife of Justice Clarence Thomas, speaks out against Obama’s health care reform law at a Tea Party rally outside the U.S. Capitol in 2010. Her activities raised concerns about the propriety of a justice’s spouse being a leader in a political movement.
(photo credit i16)
Clarence and Virginia Thomas at a Federalist Society meeting in Washington in 2007.
(photo credit i17)
Solicitor General Donald Verrilli Jr. on the Supreme Court steps during a brief recess from oral arguments on health care reform in 2012. The justices gave Verrilli a tough time but ultimately vindicated him by ruling in his favor.
(photo credit i18)
The current members of the Supreme Court: (back row, from left) Sonia Sotomayor, Stephen Breyer, Samuel Alito, Elena Kagan, (front row, from left) Clarence Thomas, Antonin Scalia, John Roberts, Anthony Kennedy, and Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
(photo credit i19)
ALSO BY JEFFREY TOOBIN
Opening Arguments: A Young Lawyer’s First Case—United States v. Oliver North
The Run of His Life: The People v. O. J. Simpson
A Vast Conspiracy: The Real Story of the Sex Scandal That Nearly Brought Down a President
Too Close to Call: The Thirty-Six-Day Battle to Decide the 2000 Election
The Nine: Inside the Secret World of the Supreme Court
My thanks to my friends at Doubleday, starting with my editor, Bill Thomas. Phyllis Grann also lavished attention on this book and improved it a great deal. Thank you as well to Coralie Hunter, Todd Doughty, Roslyn Schloss, and Bette Alexander. For our sixth book together, my agent, Esther Newberg, has steered me the right way. My thanks as well to John Q. Barrett, of the St. John’s University School of Law, and Samuel Issacharoff, of the New York University School of Law, for their helpful comments on the manuscript. For fact-checking and research assistance, I am grateful to Lila Byock, Alex Bernstein, and Avi Zenilman. Thank you as well to Silvia Berinstein. Ellen and Adam Toobin were away at college when I wrote this book, but their inspiration to me is ever present.
I remain privileged to work at
The New Yorker
, where David Remnick has been a generous boss and a loyal friend. I am fortunate to work with Dorothy Wickenden, John Bennet, and Amy Davidson.
Amy McIntosh is my wife and true love. She’s a good editor, too.
This book is based principally on my interviews with the justices and more than forty of their law clerks. The interviews were on a not-for-attribution basis—that is, I could use the information provided but without quoting directly or identifying the source.
In addition to the works cited in the text and below, I have benefited from the day-to-day coverage of the Supreme Court press corps, especially that of Adam Liptak, Lyle Denniston, Dahlia Lithwick, Tony Mauro, David Savage, Nina Totenberg, Pete Williams, and my CNN colleague Bill Mears. My thanks also to the Public Information Office of the Court, its excellent website,
www.supremecourt.gov
, and Kathy Arberg, Patricia McCabe Estrada, and Scott Markley.