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Post by cadoodlebug on Feb 19, 2016 0:53:32 GMT
I heard that this morning and it just flabbergasted me. Maybe it is common knowledge and I'm out of the loop. What are the statistical odds of that happening? There are 6 Catholics and 3 of the Jewish faith. Four justices are from NY and all are graduates of either Harvard or Yale. Evidently Justice Scalia said they needed some diversity: a Protestant, someone who graduated from another college and from another area of the country.
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grinningcat
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Post by grinningcat on Feb 19, 2016 0:57:27 GMT
It wouldn't even cross my mind to question the religious affiliation of a judge. Honest question: why is religion is a requirement or even something of public knowledge when it comes to a Supreme Court judge? Shouldn't that be irrelevant?
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Post by Merge on Feb 19, 2016 1:01:15 GMT
It wouldn't even cross my mind to question the religious affiliation of a judge. Honest question: why is religion is a requirement or even something of public knowledge when it comes to a Supreme Court judge? Shouldn't that be irrelevant? I had no idea and had honestly never thought about it, and I bet most Americans didn't know, either. Which speaks pretty well of how little religion has formed any part of the judicial process for the SC.
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AnotherPea
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Post by AnotherPea on Feb 19, 2016 1:04:45 GMT
It wouldn't even cross my mind to question the religious affiliation of a judge. Honest question: why is religion is a requirement or even something of public knowledge when it comes to a Supreme Court judge? Shouldn't that be irrelevant? The same could be said for sex and race, correct?
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Post by cadoodlebug on Feb 19, 2016 1:14:52 GMT
It wouldn't even cross my mind to question the religious affiliation of a judge. Honest question: why is religion is a requirement or even something of public knowledge when it comes to a Supreme Court judge? Shouldn't that be irrelevant? It has never crossed my mind either but the statistic gave me pause.
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Post by lucyg on Feb 19, 2016 2:21:57 GMT
I knew all of that and I think it's just a temporary anomaly for now, as far as religion goes. Maybe it's a function of the more recent efforts to include a more ethnically diverse court ... when you have an Italian Justice (Scalia, the first) and a Latina Justice, you're going to tilt toward more Catholics. On the other hand, you'd expect (in general) that a back Justice would be Protestant, not Catholic ... but Thomas is Catholic. It will balance out eventually. The tilt toward Harvard and Yale, though ... I don't know. Good luck with that.
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Post by ntsf on Feb 19, 2016 2:23:24 GMT
we need another william o douglas...from Washington State....
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Post by cadoodlebug on Feb 19, 2016 2:23:26 GMT
I knew all of that and I think it's just a temporary anomaly for now, as far as religion goes. Maybe it's a function of the more recent efforts to include a more ethnically diverse court ... when you have an Italian Justice (Scalia, the first) and a Latina Justice, you're going to tilt toward more Catholics. On the other hand, you'd expect (in general) that a back Justice would be Protestant, not Catholic ... but Thomas is Catholic. It will balance out eventually. The tilt toward Harvard and Yale, though ... I don't know. Good luck with that. All I can think of is Rory Gilmore!
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Post by ntsf on Feb 19, 2016 2:35:34 GMT
at least stephen breyer went to high school down the street from me... he is a west coast guy.
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Post by Zee on Feb 19, 2016 2:38:27 GMT
I'd love it of religion never played any part in any court.
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oldcrow
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Post by oldcrow on Feb 19, 2016 2:45:00 GMT
It wouldn't even cross my mind to question the religious affiliation of a judge. Honest question: why is religion is a requirement or even something of public knowledge when it comes to a Supreme Court judge? Shouldn't that be irrelevant? I have to agree 100 per cent.
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Nicole in TX
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Post by Nicole in TX on Feb 19, 2016 2:47:14 GMT
According to Wikipedia the majority of Americans are Protestant. That should be reflected somewhere in the court. It is really odd it is not.
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Nicole in TX
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Post by Nicole in TX on Feb 19, 2016 2:49:34 GMT
It wouldn't even cross my mind to question the religious affiliation of a judge. Honest question: why is religion is a requirement or even something of public knowledge when it comes to a Supreme Court judge? Shouldn't that be irrelevant? I have to agree 100 per cent. So if the court was all male or all white we should be ok with it? Cause gender and race are irrelevant? You can't have it both ways.
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Post by moveablefeast on Feb 19, 2016 2:54:30 GMT
It wouldn't even cross my mind to question the religious affiliation of a judge. Honest question: why is religion is a requirement or even something of public knowledge when it comes to a Supreme Court judge? Shouldn't that be irrelevant? The same could be said for sex and race, correct? It makes this boring old lower-middle class evangelical white girl really happy to see the diversity of this country reflected in halls of power of all sorts. So while I don't think they should be chosen on that basis, I find it to be a sign of progress when the best candidates for the job are also candidates that have an opportunity to contribute to the diversity of the office. So if Srinivasan or Nguyen or another candidate who would increase the diversity of the Court happens to rise to the top of the heap, I would consider that a positive thing.
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Post by epeanymous on Feb 19, 2016 2:59:58 GMT
It's an historical anomaly, as, historically, almost every single justice has been a Protestant (91 of 112) Justices Stevens and Souter, the last two retirees, were Protestant.
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AmeliaBloomer
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Post by AmeliaBloomer on Feb 19, 2016 3:03:41 GMT
Talking about the religious affiliation (or atheism) of justices doesn't necessarily mean that religion is part of the court.
We talk about the race, ethnicity, and sex of candidates for SC justice.
I think some may be forgetting that for too long the Supreme Court reflected the anti-Catholicism and anti-Semitism of the country. We had many, many all-Protestant or majority-Protestant courts. That doesn't reflect the country.
It took 60 years to get the first Catholic justice...then only six Catholics in the next 150 years...then - boom! - six Catholics in the same group. And not liberal, Democratic, socially justice-ie Catholics (which is the world I grew up in); five of them are (with Scalia) very conservative Catholics, including a black arch-conservative Catholic. (A rare bird, that.) In my circles, there has been much discussion about it.
And I agree that the Ivy League pedigree will be the last to fall...if ever.
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kate
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Post by kate on Feb 19, 2016 3:04:59 GMT
While we're at it, I wonder if they all came from privileged backgrounds... Seems we should have socioeconomic diversity, too, right?
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oldcrow
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Post by oldcrow on Feb 19, 2016 3:25:19 GMT
I have to agree 100 per cent. So if the court was all male or all white we should be ok with it? Cause gender and race are irrelevant? You can't have it both ways. The OP addressed religion as did grinningcat. I did not read any of the other posts before posting and somewhere someone threw in gender and race so I did not address them because at the point I posted they were not on the table for me. Gender and race are pretty evident, all you have to do is look and you can see any inequality. But things like religion and sexual orientation are not. You would have to research the person, invade their privacy to find these things. If you read and comprehend what grinningcat said you will realize that she questioned why religion was relevant. And I agreed with that. The OP was about the unequal situation religionwise it did not address inequality in general. Perhaps you should start a new thread to discuss general inequality.
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Post by SnowWhite on Feb 19, 2016 3:25:59 GMT
According to Wikipedia the majority of Americans are Protestant. That should be reflected somewhere in the court. It is really odd it is not. Why? The majority of American are women, that's not reflected in the make-up of the SC, the majority of Americans are non-white, that's not reflected in the make-up of the SC either. Religion plays no role in our justice system, who gives a flying fig what religion judges subscribe to?
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Post by anniefb on Feb 19, 2016 3:40:18 GMT
Well IMO whether a prospective judge/justice comes from a certain socio-economic group or holds or doesn't hold particular religious beliefs shouldn't even be relevant. The key considerations are qualifications, personal qualities, relevant experience and whether they're able to act impartially, independently and fairly.
However, this did make me go and check the courts website in New Zealand to see if there was anything reported about the background, religious beliefs etc held by our judges. According to the most recent census (2013) 31% of all judges say they hold no religious beliefs, 20% are Catholic, roughly 40% Protestant and the remainder are other religion. I thought this was pretty similar to the results for the general population where 41% said no religious beliefs, 13% are Catholic, 36% Protestant, 2.11% Hindu, 1.5% Buddhist, 1.18 Islam and the rest are 'other religion' or don't want to say.
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AmeliaBloomer
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Post by AmeliaBloomer on Feb 19, 2016 4:17:43 GMT
The OP was about the unequal situation religionwise it did not address inequality in general. Perhaps you should start a new thread to discuss general inequality. Oops. Look like I flouted this rule in my first post. Heh. I'm only half kidding when I say many of the Catholics I know "look" Catholic. (Because they're Irish-, Polish-, or Italian-American and look it.) But seriously, should we only consider diversity (and choosing people who are representative of a cross-section of Americans) if the diversity feature can be SEEN? Even if the person in question does not consider knowledge of the "invisible" features an invasion of privacy? ETA: For me, the point is that Catholics and Jews were excluded from the Court for a long time. And we still haven't seen a Muslim or (admitted) atheist. Excluding people because of religion matters as much as excluding them because of other demographic features. For me.
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mimima
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Post by mimima on Feb 19, 2016 4:28:40 GMT
I did, actually.
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AmeliaBloomer
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Post by AmeliaBloomer on Feb 19, 2016 5:24:58 GMT
Ha! I just turned on the TV just as Stephen Colbert was saying...
...wait for it...
"Catholics are the Jews of Christianity."
(Had to share.)
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Feb 19, 2016 6:28:25 GMT
A little geographic diversity might be a good thing. Six of the justices are from the Northeast.
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Post by lucyg on Feb 19, 2016 6:41:16 GMT
According to Wikipedia the majority of Americans are Protestant. That should be reflected somewhere in the court. It is really odd it is not. For most of the first two centuries, almost all of the justices were white male Protestants. Now you're going to be resentful the first time there happens (not deliberately on anyone's part, as far as I know) to be none? I think it would be fine if the next nominee were a white male Protestant. But I don't think it's needed.
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anniebygaslight
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Post by anniebygaslight on Feb 19, 2016 9:29:38 GMT
I'd love it of religion never played any part in any court.
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Nicole in TX
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Post by Nicole in TX on Feb 19, 2016 11:22:41 GMT
According to Wikipedia the majority of Americans are Protestant. That should be reflected somewhere in the court. It is really odd it is not. Why? The majority of American are women, that's not reflected in the make-up of the SC, the majority of Americans are non-white, that's not reflected in the make-up of the SC either. Religion plays no role in our justice system, who gives a flying fig what religion judges subscribe to? So we should take those factors into consideration as well. If we have highly educated justices from excellent schools, we are not going to by pass the Harvard/Yale factor. (I love the Rory reference!)
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Nicole in TX
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Post by Nicole in TX on Feb 19, 2016 11:24:44 GMT
According to Wikipedia the majority of Americans are Protestant. That should be reflected somewhere in the court. It is really odd it is not. For most of the first two centuries, almost all of the justices were white male Protestants. Now you're going to be resentful the first time there happens (not deliberately on anyone's part, as far as I know) to be none? I think it would be fine if the next nominee were a white male Protestant. But I don't think it's needed. Where did I say I was resentful? It is something that should be taken into consideration when selecting the next justice. I am totally cracking up here at the folks that constantly whine about gender and race equality, then they say this is the one time it doesn't matter!
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raindancer
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Post by raindancer on Feb 19, 2016 11:27:04 GMT
So if the court was all male or all white we should be ok with it? Cause gender and race are irrelevant? You can't have it both ways. The OP addressed religion as did grinningcat. I did not read any of the other posts before posting and somewhere someone threw in gender and race so I did not address them because at the point I posted they were not on the table for me. Gender and race are pretty evident, all you have to do is look and you can see any inequality. But things like religion and sexual orientation are not. You would have to research the person, invade their privacy to find these things. If you read and comprehend what grinningcat said you will realize that she questioned why religion was relevant. And I agreed with that. The OP was about the unequal situation religionwise it did not address inequality in general. Perhaps you should start a new thread to discuss general inequality. Gender and race and sexuality are not a choice. Religion is different.
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Nicole in TX
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Post by Nicole in TX on Feb 19, 2016 11:31:53 GMT
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