The Supreme Court ethics mess is today's Watergate. Let's treat it that way
It’s naïve to say that 1969 — a peak year for the Vietnam War, the SDS and the Black Panthers — was a simpler time in America, but it is clear in hindsight that the era’s views around judicial ethics were more robust than the anything-goes vibe of today’s Supreme Court. Fortas, bolstered by his close ties to LBJ, was both a powerful advocate for expanding justice (especially to young people) and a power broker with friends in high places.
One of Fortas’ friends was the most notorious shady Wall Street trader of the 1960s, a man named Louis Wolfson. Shortly after joining the Supreme Court in 1965, at a time when Wolfson was under investigation, the financier’s foundation made an arrangement to pay Fortas a $20,000 yearly retainer. Months later, the justice realized this was a really bad idea and paid the money back — but when Life magazine exposed the dealings in 1969, the pressure on Fortas was enormous.
The new, hardball-playing Republican president, Richard Nixon, had no qualms about ordering the Justice Department to investigate Fortas. Perhaps more importantly, outgoing Chief Justice Earl Warren, a friend and liberal ally, urged Fortas to resign — which he did, just days after the Life article appeared. A Supreme Court justice’s early retirement due to scandal was unprecedented.
And apparently it may never be repeated — even as ethics on the nation’s highest court plunges to unthinkable lows.
https://www.inquirer.com/opinion/commentary/supreme-court-ethical-scandal-clarence-thomas-20230507.html
