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I'm kind of curious what the specific mechanism was for this. I assume the quotes came from a brief--which one? Did no one review the source material? Did they just decide it was good enough notwithstanding how the context makes them pretty dubious authority?
These mistakes originalist justices are making aren’t about disputed interpretations of history, with evidence on both sides. They’re pulling quotes out of context to attribute ideas to founding figures that those figures adamantly opposed. (via @andycraig.bsky.social) reason.com/volokh/2024/...
The Supreme Court's Dubious Use of History in Department of State v. Munozreason.com Justice Amy Coney Barrett's majority opinion includes significant errors, and violates some of her own precepts against excessive reliance on questionable history.
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Part of Somin's disagreement with the majority is just methodological though--he seems more sympathetic to the liberal critique of Glucksberg, as signaled by his criticism of relying on the 1882 immigration law. If you can't rely on racist Congresses, not much left of "history and tradition"