Miers' religious views: instance of recusal on moral grounds

[Bob Sheridan]

It's one thing for a judge to recuse on grounds of stock ownership or 
"my brother...," but quite another to state reasons in a case of moral 
choice.  Why?  Because it's giving critics, including litigants, a club 
to beat you with when you /don't/ recuse in an arguably similar case; in 
a hearing on recusal, perhaps.  The less said the better in the world of 
judicial politics, I should think.

rs

Sanford Levinson wrote:

> Mike Paulsen, I believe, has argued that judges should  write opinions 
> when recusing on moral grounds.  Sandy, do you think Mike is right 
> about that?   
>  
> I haven't thought it through, but my initial reaction is, why not?  In 
> most cases, justifying recusal would require only a sentence or two:  
> E.g., "I own some shares of IBM; my son once represented Princeton 
> University (the apparent reason that Justice Brennan recused himself 
> in a case that I was involved in against Princeton); my brother 
> decided the case below (I think this was why Justice Breyer did not 
> participate in Raich, but I might be wrong on this), etc."  It would 
> be truly interesting if the reasons for recusal went beyond something 
> like this.  If a justice said "I no longer can collaborate with the 
> machinery of death and therefore will go on strike," that should 
> surely require a fairly substantial explanation, which I take it is 
> Mike's point.
>  
> sandy 
>
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