After issuing Where Is the Love... for Judge Frank Easterbrook?, Article III Groupie received lots of great emails in response. The most exciting of the bunch: celebrity correspondence from judicial sibling Gregg Easterbrook, which A3G will now publish here in Courthouse Forum!!! (As you may recall, Courthouse Forum -- named after Penthouse Forum -- is where A3G publishes the most sizzling and scrumptious letters from her readers, in unredacted form.)
As noted in A3G's post about Judge Easterbrook, Gregg writes the Tuesday Morning Quarterback column for NFL.com. As noted in the bio on his website, Mr. Easterbrook is also "the author of several books, a senior editor of The New Republic, a contributing editor of The Atlantic Monthly, a contributing editor of The Washington Monthly, and a visiting fellow at the Brookings Institution." WOW!
And now, on to Gregg Easterbrook's message. Before reading it, please note the following disclaimer from Mr. Easterbrook: "Frank has nothing to do with my touting him. When I tout him, he never even knows about it until it's too late to stop me."
Okay, here's the email:
Dear AIIIG,
Many thanks for the kind words about my brother and for calling me "cool." If only my wife thought that!
Frank did receive serious White House consideration during the late Reagan presidency, but was thought too young then. Reagan, bless him, understood that intellectual firepower is important to governing. Not all presidents get this point, and the result is often short legacies. This year he's been cited by the Wall Street Journal, Baltimore Sun, Slate and elsewhere as a deserving Supreme Court candidate.
Here are more arguments for Frank:
1). He is a first generation American, our parents being naturalized Canadians. Okay, Canadio-Americans are not an important demographic. But first-generation Americans really, really love America, which is a good quality in a justice.
2.) He has genuine bipartisan credentials, having been a deputy S.G. under both Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter. Genuine bipartisan credentials are in this day and age nothing to be sneezed at.
3). He was confirmed to the appeals court unanimously by the Senate.
4). His record of arguing and winning cases before the Supreme Court is about the same as John Roberts's.
5). His record of having opinions upheld (or dissents sided with) at the Supreme Court level is among the best on the federal bench.
6). He is one of the few legal scholars in the world able to install, unassisted, a wireless home LAN system, which he did for my kids last Christmas.
7). He's sentimental. Every year on Christmas Eve he watches the 1951 black and white Alastair Sim movie of "A Christmas Carol." (This is the best "Christmas Carol" ever, we watched it annually on Canadian television growing up as boys.)
8). He decided the Indianapolis First Amendment case [Hudnut] strictly on the Constitution, knowing his decision would make powerful people mad. (Ed Meese, others.) We want justices who worry more about the opinion of the Framers than the opinions of those in power in the present.
9). He's tough on crime and Chicago School on economics, but a progressive on women's rights (his Johnson Controls decision), minority rights and environmental protection. Tough on crime, free-market on economics and progressive on women's rights, minority rights and environmental protection pretty much describes the contemporary American political center.
10). He likes DisneyWorld and LegoLand. Took my kids, when little, both places.
Best,
Gregg
PS: needless to say Frank has nothing to do with anything I say about him.
PPS: There is a third cool Easterbrook brother, Neil Easterbrook, assistant professor of English at TCU and the handsome one in the family.
Absolutely awesome!!! A3G just loved this message, especially the tidbits about how Judge Easterbrook was considered for the Supreme Court in the late Reagan administration, but was viewed as too young. This led A3G to think that SCOTUS nominees are sort of like sexual partners: "Yes, we want them young -- but not TOO young!"*
In terms of the "top 10" list of reasons to put Judge Easterbrook on the Supreme Court, A3G especially enjoyed items (6), (7), and (10). Can you imagine spotting a leading circuit court judge at DisneyWorld? Talk about a judicial sightation!
* For example, take Judge Easterbrook's colleague, Judge Diane Sykes. At 48 years old, she was probably a little too young and unseasoned to be considered as a replacement for Justice O'Connor. If judicial hottie Sykes were a few years older -- or maybe Latina -- we might have been spared the prospect of Associate Justice Harriet Miers...
Most of what I've read about Sykes today has been glowingly positive. She would not be my first choice, but she would certainly be a good choice, young for it (she would, by more than just default, become the most attractive Justice in our nation's history) or not.
Posted by: Simon | October 24, 2005 at 06:48 PM
I think he was saying that Judge Easterbrook is (1) "tough on crime" and (2) "Chicago School on economics." The word "tough" only modifies "crime," and the term "Chicago School" only modifies "economics."
Posted by: | October 20, 2005 at 11:30 PM
Frank would be an excellent justice.
Adding to his brother's top ten:
11. Frank has deep expertise in economics and the law, which makes him uniquely qualified to decide the majority of SCOTUS cases, which involve economic and property rights rather than constitutional issues.
12. Frank is a classmate of Doug Ginsburg but I don't remember him smoking anything that smelled odd at law school parties.
13. Frank's law school nickname was "the Easterbunny".
Posted by: Tom Scharbach | October 20, 2005 at 10:29 PM
He's tough on crime and Chicago School on economics
Yeah, we need someone who's tough on the Chicago School of economics. (That second "on" is a typo, right?)
Posted by: Attila (Pillage Idiot) | October 20, 2005 at 10:50 AM
How about GREGG Easterbrook for SCOTUS? He seems like a charming, smart guy, and can't be worse than Harriet "Forgot to Pay those Pesky DC Bar Dues" Miers.....
BTW, A3G, I'm expecting a post from you on how Miers not only spaced on the holding of Meyer v. Nebraska when meeting with Chuck Schumer (hello, Con Law 101???), but how she managed to space on paying her DC bar dues.
Posted by: C | October 19, 2005 at 10:12 PM