07.28.06
Rich gets it right, and misses the point
Rich Lowry on National Review Online makes a good point on the remarkable self-restraint being shown by courts in New York and Washington on the issue of same-sex marriage recently, but I find a larger point very interesting.
Like every other endeavor, people don’t like to be wrong. Except for the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in Cali, which has a staggering rate of overturns by the SCOTUS, most judges don’t like to be overturned on appeal.
With the nomination of Roberts and Alito to the SCOTUS, the balance has shifted, if ever so slightly… O’Connor always gave the lower courts the possibility that even the wackiest of rulings would be upheld, so they had more opportunity to do stupid stuff- making laws from the bench- with that in mind.
Now that the Supremes have a balance towards sanity, the lower courts have to rein themselves in a little, or get the proverbial smack-down by the 9 in the really neat robes. Just my theory. 
