The United States Supreme Court’s new ethics code, touted as a landmark move by some justices, was met with criticism last year due to its lack of enforcement mechanisms. However, a recent leak of secret discussions from behind the bench reveals that some justices were opposed to any real oversight.
According to the leak, published in The New York Times, Justice Neil Gorsuch was a fierce opponent of the idea that the code be anything more than voluntary. He was backed by Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, who argued that critics of the court were in bad faith.
The liberal justices on the court, Elena Kagan, Sonia Sotomayor, and Ketanji Brown Jackson, advocated for some form of enforcement. Kagan even proposed the idea of a group of experienced federal judges serving as a sounding board for justices to consult on ethics code issues.
Despite the dissenting voices, the Supreme Court ultimately placed no restrictions on taking gifts, accepting travel, or real estate deals. However, they did give themselves a broad carve-out for book deals and sales. Justice Sotomayor, who received $3.7 million for her memoir and children’s books, is now allowed to use court staff for her book events.
The code’s lack of teeth has led critics to call the new rules “more loophole than law.” Michael Waldman, president of the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University’s School of Law, wrote after the code was released last year, “These new rules are more loophole than law.”
