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‘Isolated’ John Roberts has been ‘outflanked and marginalized’ as the court’s reputation hits a low point: columnist
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‘Isolated’ John Roberts has been ‘outflanked and marginalized’ as the court’s reputation hits a low point: columnist
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In her column for the Washington Post, longtime political observer Ruth Marcus suggested that the career arc of Chief Justice John Roberts is ending in”‘tragedy” as the so-called “Robert court” has spun out of his control and the reputation of the court under his stewardship is hitting new lows every day.
With the court still reeling from the overturning of Roe v. Wade –that set off a firestorm with polls showing a whopping 62 percent of the public disapproved of the gutting a fifty-year-old Supreme court ruling — Roberts has been on the receiving end of criticism for not swaying conservative associate Supreme Court justices to take a much more moderate position.
As Marcus sees it, Roberts’ reputation for being a guiding force on the court has been irreparably damaged.
“On the final day of oral arguments last term, the chief justice’s voice cracked with emotion as he bade farewell to the retiring Justice Stephen G. Breyer. It was a striking moment for the normally buttoned-up John G. Roberts Jr., and one that seemed to signify more than sorrow at the departure of a longtime colleague,” she wrote. “It is not far-fetched to imagine that Roberts was mourning the decisive end of his vision of presiding over an institution seen as operating above the partisan fray.”
According to the columnist, Roberts “is an at times isolated and even tragic figure. Roberts wanted to be at the helm of a court that was more often unanimous than splintered; now it is cleaved, 6-3, along hardened ideological lines.”
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