President President John G. Roberts Jr. defended the integrity of the Supreme Court on Friday in his first public remarks after a tumultuous term, saying disagreement with its decisions should not raise questions about its legitimacy.
“The court has always decided controversial cases and the decisions have always been subject to intense criticism and that’s entirely appropriate,” Roberts told a gathering of judges and lawyers in Colorado Springs. But he said disagreement with the court’s role in deciding what the law is has morphed into criticism of its legitimacy.
“You don’t want the political branches to tell you what the law is. And you don’t want public opinion to be the guide of what the right decision is,” said Roberts, who added with a laugh, “Yes, all of our opinions are open to criticism. In fact, our members do a great job of criticizing some views from time to time. But the fact that people disagree with an opinion is not a basis for criticizing the legitimacy of the court.”
With the support of three justices picked by President Donald Trump in the past five years, the Supreme Court now has a conservative majority of 6 to 3. Those justices sent the court on a dramatic swing to the right in the term that ended this summer, nullifying the guarantee of the constitutional right to abortion a Roe v. Wadeimplemented a gun control law in New York, limiting the Biden administration’s power to address climate change and scoring victories for religious conservatives.
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The court’s approval rating has fallen to one of the lowest levels ever in public opinion polls, led by disgruntled Democrats and, to a lesser extent, those who consider themselves independent.
But Roberts said it’s the Supreme Court’s job to decide what the law is. “That role doesn’t change simply because people disagree with this opinion or that opinion or with a particular modality of jurisprudence,” he said.
No direct mention of the court’s decision to overturn nearly 50 years of striking precedent RoeRoberts acknowledged the difficulty of the past year.
“It was stressful every morning driving to a Supreme Court with barricades around,” Roberts said. And it has been “unnatural” to hold oral arguments by teleconference or in front of a small number of court staff and reporters. The courthouse has been closed to the public since March 2020 due to pandemic concerns.
“When we take the bench on the first Monday in October at 10 a.m., the public will be there to watch us,” Roberts said. “I think moving on from things that were unfortunate is the best way to respond.”
Roberts was interviewed by two fellow judges at the Bench & Bar Conference of the US Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit. He was not asked about one of the things that made the term so controversial: a leaked draft of the Supreme Court’s abortion opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization.
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The leak of Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr.’s draft opinion. shocked the court, which prides itself on keeping internal deliberations secret. In May, Roberts ordered an investigation into the Politico leak, but has not said anything publicly about it since then.
Earlier, at the same conference in Colorado Springs, Judge Neil M. Gorsuch said the internal investigation was continuing and he expected a report to come soon. He did not say whether it will be made public.
“Inappropriate efforts to influence judicial decision-making, from any side, by whomever, are a threat to the judicial decision-making process and inhibit our ability to communicate with each other,” Gorsuch said.
The draft leaked to Politico was substantially the same as the majority opinion upholding Mississippi’s law. Gorsuch was one of five justices who voted to overturn Roe. Roberts said he would have kept the Mississippi law but not overturned it Roeand the three liberals on the court dissented.
The decision has sparked protests outside the homes of the justices, notably Roberts and Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh, who live near each other in suburban Maryland.
Karlik reported from Colorado Springs.