Always right

IF YOU were bold enough to ask Antonin Scalia questions, you had to be precise. Otherwise the bushy black brows would furrow, the chin would crumple and the pudgy, puckish body would start to rock, eager to get at you. Wasn’t he violently opposed to Roe v Wade, the abortion ruling? “Adamantly opposed, that’s better.” Did he have any guilty pleasures? “How can it be pleasurable, if it’s guilty?” Lesser lawyers who were vague in oral argument faced a barrage of sarcasm or, if he agreed with them, constant chiding to do better. (“That’s your strong point!”) Dissenting colleagues at the Supreme Court had their opinions described as “argle-bargle”, “jiggery pokery” and “pure applesauce”.

Words had meaning. He revered them and used them scrupulously, even in insult. The law was written in words, and those ideally laid down bright lines for everyone to follow. As a committed textualist, he wasted no time looking to legislative history, the purported purpose of a law or the comments of some egregious congressman. It meant what it said.