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Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, Clarence Thomas, recently published his autobiography, which reviews his first 43 years of life in an absorbing and gripping manner. (He mentions nothing about his 16 years on the Court.) Thomas’s real father abandoned him and he was raised actually by his grandfather. His grandfather taught him self-reliance and discipline.
Being raised in the South, Thomas suffered from two handicaps: He was black in the segregated South and he was part of a Creole-speaking community, called the Geeches or Gullahs. They were even looked down upon by other blacks. Nonetheless, he attended Conception Seminary, 1967-1968, received his AB from Holy Cross College (cum laude) and his law degree from Yale in 1974. He then served in several different roles, both private and public, and was Chairman of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission from 1982-1990. In 1991 he took his seat as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court. During the confirmation hearings, Anita Hill, a former employee of his, accused him of having sexually harassed her several years before. She even said that he described scenes from porn films to her. He denied everything then and now in this autobiography. Both Thomas and Hill stand by their stories.
There are two criticisms that are leveled at Thomas by his critics, now that he is on the Court:
- Thomas is not smart or clever enough to be on the Court. His critics contend that his typical silence during public hearings betrays this ignorance, and, besides, he blindly follows Antonin Scalia. However, Jan Crawford Greenberg’s new book, Supreme Conflict, reveals that Thomas behind closed doors is apparently cogent and forceful. Indeed, the dissent he wrote for his third case on the Court prompted both Scalia and Rehnquist to change their minds!
- Thomas is cruel and applies the law coldly. But it is very clear that Thomas believes that it is up to the lawmakers to make the law, not the Supreme Court. So, he rules against racial preferences because he believes that the equal protection clause means what it says. Rights not mentioned in the Constitution but created by the Court (e.g., abortion rights), he argues, ultimately undermine rule of law.
Clarence Thomas is no lightweight. The Court is richer and more diverse because he is on the Court. It is shameful that blacks and liberals do not see it that way!
See “Lexington” in The Economist (6 October 2007). |
