http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/judicial/supremecourtopinions/2010-01-21-court-analysis_N.htm When liberal Justice John Paul Stevens dissented Thursday as the Supreme Court permitted new corporate spending in elections, he invoked the names of influential and long-gone justices.
He began with retired Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, with whom he had worked on a 2003 case the majority was partially overruling. He referred to the late Justice Thurgood Marshall's warning in a 1990 case, also overturned, about how corporate money can distort political debate. Stevens then cited the late Justice Byron White about the importance of deferring to Congress, which had passed the law the majority discarded Thursday.
As Stevens invoked lions of the past and decried the majority's decision, he spoke for twice as long from the bench as Justice Anthony Kennedy had for the majority. Over the course of his 20 minutes, Stevens also spoke with more passion — and more weariness.
His words about the changed court reminded spectators not only of a passing era in campaign finance law but of all that Stevens had witnessed over his nearly 35 years on the bench, including the ideological shift to the right under Chief Justice John Roberts, appointed by President George W. Bush in 2005.
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