Scalia on healthcare ruling: "Water over the dam"

turning to the Justice of the Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia has been 26 years as a conservative leader on the Supreme Court in a rare interview on 2d talked about some of the courts most controversial rulings including the decision in June upholding President Obama's Affordable Health Care Act how about the ruling on Obamacare as we know it today that heart uh it was it was hard in in one respect I think the hard question was the Commerce Clause question right I don't think the tax question was a hard question the Commerce Clause question I think was hard I could have could have seen that coming up the other way but to be in the majority on that but put lose on the on the tax question I would never have guessed I mean the I was totally surprised by the tax aspect of it tell me about it assume that you birdie knows I've came out of the left field from people didn't it all right deal which was it yeah well it's right then it was a tax for one purpose but not for exactly right you know anyway but donor over the dam yeah I know you won't say that I mean you know you're sort of said to people about Bush vs. gore you got over here over over you know yet it decided a presidential election and what were you know some court was going to decide it the only issue was what if I said the surprised which means you blame Gore because he brought the case in Florida he brought it he wanted he wanted judges to decide it so judges decided it what okay what any possibly have give no regret about that deal about that case yeah oh it was an easy case it really was why was it so easy look at it on the prints about the Florida Court the prints did you stop the Florida courts in the midst SPS but on the principle question of whether the Florida courts violated the Constitution the vote was seven to two wasn't even close the only issue that was five to four was whether we should put an end to this nonsense an immediate decide the case or give them another couple of weeks while the whole world was laughing at us and we couldn't because the country couldn't decide it was present that's right and we couldn't have a transition yeah but see that's what people think that was a political decision that's part of the reason they think it was a political decision in part not so much more and did they think it was a political decision because the politics of the country made you say we've got to do this the way we did the plan or in order to get this over with the court decided that in the interest of the national in the national interest they got to get this over with the remedy for a case is always subject to the courts discretion and always depends upon the realities on the ground not the law but what the remedy will be whether you don't do it immediately give another two weeks that's that's that's not an issue of law it's an issue of of practicality do you believe the United States is well served by the Supreme Court it has you know there's another line about the British the British stiff upper upper left yeah it's the only war we've got you know and I could say the same about the Serbian tell me on a Supreme Court we've got you know yes I think yes yes yes yes in other way you know given given what well given the philosophies of the judges I I think they're honest men and women and I think they decide the case fairly and honestly according to their lights but assess your own performance so far for me I mean by that I'm a degraded yes I wasn't you'd agree what's the presidency yes I don't want to give myself a tone anymore that he don't know he said that to me yes yes yes he said that today where's this question or would I do I go around asking everybody gracious but I mean I'm serious though um have you had the impact that you had did you believe you would like to have answer has to be no well it depends on what you mean by the impact well the impact as you'd like everybody to see it your way yeah that doesn't happen you know a delightful person you know I mean this debate he believes in about what he called originalism or textualism is an ongoing debate but he's a fascinating interesting guy who loves the the exchange of ideas and his good friend of the court is Ruth Bader Ginsburg yeah and What did he say about that whether he's achieved you know when he wanted to I mean he wanted to be chief justice he loved that but I'd rather win this argument that he believes in and he didn't think he thinks he's made some progress on that but it has a bit to go for example he pointed out that they're now three professors on the Harvard Law School where he went to law school who never leave the principles that he believes in in terms of textualism mmm-hmm and what about on Obamacare or health care I mean he didn't say whether he felt like Chief Justice John Roberts had you know surprised some of them on the course well I think the art of the tax darknes he suggested was not an argument that he thought you know what he would have preferred to see yeah but the Commerce Clause is important because the Commerce Clause opened itself up the in terms of what Justice Roberts wrote to future questions of the same size

Channel: CBS News

Views: 228,981

Keywords: cbsepisode, antonin, scalia, justice, supreme, court, conservative, right, wing, republican, appointed, healthcare, affordable, act, unconstitutional, constitution, charlie, rose

Id: zAt1GcxTA8Y

Length: 5min 38sec (338 seconds)

Published: Wed Nov 28 2012