Rehnquist's Abuse of History

[Justin Schwartz]

Judge Posner has a recent article on the abuse of history in judicial 
opinions, in which he makes fun of judges who rely on potted history, which 
most of them who rely on history do, and suggests that they stop trying to 
be historians, which most of them are not, and just decide based on policy. 
Justice Rehnquist is probably a better historian than most judges: he has 
actually written several well-regarded books on legal history. --jks


>From: kelley <kwalker2 at gte.net>
>Reply-To: lbo-talk at lists.panix.com
>To: Politics <POLITICS at ALOO.NETAXS.COM>, lbo-talk at lists.panix.com
>Subject: Rehnquist's Abuse of History
>Date: Tue, 13 Feb 2001 23:10:56 -0500
>
><forwarded>
>JUSTICE WILLIAM H. REHNQUIST'S ABUSE OF HISTORY
>
>Gene Garman,
>Author of America's Real Religion
>
>
>The thesis of the following commentary is that Justice William H.
>Rehnquist distorted, abused, and misused the good name of history
>in his attempt to justify his dissent in Wallace v. Jaffree (472
>U.S. 38, 1985). There seems to be two explanations for Justice
>Rehnquist's abuse of the historical record: (1) Justice Rehnquist
>deliberately and dishonestly ignored James Madison's writings
>about the meaning of the Establishment Clause, which writings
>were written after the final version was drafted by the Senate-
>House conference committee, or (2) Justice Rehnquist is
>undereducated and his neglect of documentation from James Madison,
>as to the meaning of the Establishment Clause, was honest
>ignorance of the complete historical record.

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