By Dean Tan ’18, Staff Writer

Antonin Gregory Scalia, the longest tenured justice of The United States Supreme Court and widely considered to be the most influential Supreme Court Justice of the last few decades passed away suddenly on February 13 at a resort in West Texas. Justice Scalia was 79, having served nearly 30 years on the Supreme Court, and is survived by his wife and 9 children.

Justice Scalia was born on March 11, 1936 in Trenton to the Professor Salvatore Eugene Scalia, an immigrant from Sicily, and the elementary school teacher Catherine Louise Scalia, the daughter of Italian immigrants. Scalia graduated at the top of his class at Xavier High School in Manhattan, and then went on to study at Georgetown and later Harvard Law School, where he met and later married his wife Maureen McCarthy. Scalia practiced and taught law before serving as assistant attorney general in charge of the Office of Legal Counsel and on the Court of Appeals of the District of Columbia circuit.In 1986, President Reagan nominated Scalia to the Supreme Court after the resignation of Chief Justice Warren Berger, and Scalia was confirmed by the Senate unanimously.  

Justice Scalia is remembered for being fiercely committed to originalism, a doctrine that seeks to interpret the Constitution as it was understood by its authors and ratifiers. Calling the constitution “dead, or as I prefer to call it, enduring”, Scalia was a staunch believer that the Constitution is not a document whose meaning changes as society changes, but rather maintains its original meaning when it was adopted. As Elias Neibart ‘16 , president of Young Republicans puts it, “Justice Scalia stood as a clarion voice for judicial restraint, not falling victim to the seductive notion of ‘legislating from the bench.’ He saw his role clear—to analyze and assay the constitutionality of the law, not make it unilaterally.”

Scalia’s belief and defense of these principles have caused him to be seen as one of the most conservative justices on the Supreme Court, and perhaps the most memorable aspect of Scalia’s legacy is his loud, biting, and often unaccompanied dissents to major court cases. Justice Scalia repeatedly opposed Supreme Court decisions legalizing private homosexual conduct and same-sex marriage, as well as rights to abortion. However, his textualist approach has also brought him into conflict with his own sympathies, such as in 1989 when he struck down a law criminalizing the burning of an American flag. Though he vehemently disagreed with “scruffy, bearded, sandal-wearing people who go around burning the United States flag”, he recognized its legitimacy as a right provided by the First Amendment.

Furthermore, Justice Scalia revolutionized the way in which criminal law was interpreted and practiced, surprisingly siding with defendants in many cases. Scalia stated that the Bush administration could not indefinitely imprison a United States citizen without charge; in the case of Hamdi v. Rumsfeld in 2004, where Yaser Hamdi, a United States citizen, was being detained indefinitely under the precedent that he was an illegal enemy combatant, Scalia maintained that the extent of detention powers were to either suspend habeas corpus, or have Hamdi tried under criminal law.

With Scalia’s passing, the United States Supreme court is left divided over several remaining cases. A justice must be on the bench during the delivery of the ruling, leaving Scalia’s votes for this year unaccounted; therefore the absence of Scalia’s consistently conservative vote will leave the court split 4-4.  Mr. Hawk commented, “An even court – 8 justices – can be a very paralyzed court. So if they don’t get a nomination, you can get tremendous backup in the system that could look really terrible in terms of discrediting government in general.” President Obama will likely nominate a new justice to swing the vote in his favor, but it is unlikely that the nominee will garner the support of a Senate majority. If the seat is left vacant, the decision will be passed to the next president, but it remains unlikely that the confirmation process will be completed anytime soon, leaving the Supreme Court functioning with only 8 justices. Among the turbulence of the upcoming political elections, it is essential to remember the importance and lasting impact of the Supreme Court on our nation.