The Judicial Branch

• In Sea Northern v. Arizona, wrote part of his dissenting opinion in trochaic tetrameter: "fear of cancer from asbestos/fuzzy science manifestos"; and wrote another in cinquain [4.14].
• It's rumored that he wants the Supreme Court to wear powdered wigs like British Magistrates, and Leo thinks it might be time to suggest the Chief Justice step down [4.14].
• Ashland is an icon of liberals who stood up to several administrations in his towering judicial career. His landmark cases included Baines v. U.S. Steel, Miranda, and the case that invalidated prohibitions against interracial marriage [5.7].
• Ashland served 32 years on the Court, 12 as Chief Justice [5.17].
• If Roy Ashland were a religion, Toby would convert [5.7].
• Jed Bartlet considers Roy Ashland a great friend [5.7].
• Joe Quincy clerked for Ashland, because each year Ashland chooses one conservative clerk to argue with [5.7].
• When presented with Josh's novel suggestion that Ashland step down to be replaced by Evelyn Baker Lang, Justice Ashland agrees with much amusement [5.17].

Notable Quotes

"Marshall. John or Thurgood, either one.  I want Brandeis, Blackmun, Douglas, but you can't get them, can you?  Because it's all compromises now, the ones who have no record of scholarship, no body of opinions, nothing you can hold them to.  That's who they'll confirm -- raging mediocrities." [5.7]

"I have good days and bad, but on my worst day, I am better than the amped-up ambulance chasers you could get confirmed by this Senate." [5.7]

Go ahead, see who they pick of their favorite sons.  See what segregationist, anti-miscegenationist, Isaiah-quoting, gay-bashing bastard they come up with." [5.17]

• Fourth Circuit Judge who's liberal, and whose appearance in the White House is originally intended as a sop to the left, but who ended up as the Bartlet administration's nominee for Chief Justice of the Supreme Court [5.17].
• Her work on the 14th Amendment is, according to Toby, the stuff that things are made of; she overturned a parental consent law.
• Josh loves her, her mind, and her shoes; Toby thinks she'll scare the Republicans into happily confirming Shelton, a moderate [5.17].
• In college, Lang received a marijuana plant as a present from her roommate; in her second year of law school, she had an abortion; and she bets like a drunken sailor at her bimonthly games of hearts [5.17].

Notable Quotes

"The conservative anchor of the Court has just died, a young, brilliant thinker who brought the Right out of the closet and championed a whole conservative revival.  You cannot replace Owen Brady with a woman who overturned a parental consent law.  You'd be shishkabobed and set aflame on the South Lawn." [5.17]

"If you're Malkin, you're from Virginia, so you ask In re: Drury.  I take you point by point from the doctor to the father to Casey to undue burden to equal protection back to Roe, at which point you can't remember the question and I drink my water for a minute while you regroup." [5.17]

• Conservative Supreme Court Justice who died in 2004 [5.16] and was succeeded by Christopher Mulready [5.17].

• A retired liberal Supreme Court justice who does not get along with President Bartlet, Crouch wanted to retire five years earlier but waited for a Democrat to take office [1.9].
• Crouch took his seat the year Bartlet entered college, and served on the bench for thirty-eight years [1.9]; he was succeeded by Justice Mendoza [1.18].

Notable Quotes

"I wanted to retire five years ago, but I waited for a Democrat.  I wanted a Democrat, but instead I got you." [1.9]

• A conservative Republican Justice for whom Ainsley Hayes has clerked [2.5].
• White House Counsel Lionel Tribbey claimed Dreifort was intolerant of gays, lesbians, unions, women, poor people, and the First, Fourth, Fifth and Ninth Amendments to the Constitution [2.5].

• His father was attorney general to Eisenhower [1.9].
• Harrison attended Walnut Park Country Day, Phillips Exeter, Princeton, and Harvard Law. He was also a Rhodes Scholar and editor of the Harvard Law Review [1.9].
• Harrison frequented Sandy Hooks, a golf course at which Charlie Young once worked [1.9].
• A life-long Democrat, he clerked for Republican Supreme Court Justice Warren Burger and served as dean of the Harvard Law School [1.9].
• He has never written a judicial opinion on privacy or abortion, or revealed his thinking on Roe v. Wade [1.9].
• Harrison topped Bartlet's short list for Supreme Court Justice, but was ultimately rejected by the President because he does not recognize a constitutional right to privacy [1.9].

• Attended Yale Law School with Josh Lyman and claims to have carried Josh through ConLaw [5.16].
• Hayden's nomination to the Sixth Circuit languished in committee for 12 months, even though Josh thought he'd be confirmed by the entire Senate; Hayden almost refuses Josh's attempt to name him as a recess appointment in favor of the Deanship at Georgetown [5.16].
• When Justice Brady dies, however, Hayden's nomination fizzles [5.17].

• In the very early morning of May 8, 2003, Judge Jay was called to the White House to swear in Speaker of the House Glen Walken as Acting President when Jed Bartlet invoked the 25th Amendment [4.23].

Justice Roberto Mendoza Associate Justice of the Supreme Court

• President Bartlet's controversial nominee to fill Justice Crouch's position on the Supreme Court [1.9].
• He has a wife, Laura, and a nine-year-old son, Robbie; they have vacationed in Nova Scotia and enjoy antiquing in Connecticut [1.15].
• Mendoza attended PS 138 in Brooklyn, City University of New York, and the New York Police Academy. He was a New York City police officer from 1965-76 [1.9].
• After being shot in the leg, Mendoza took a desk job while he attended law school at night. When he earned his J.D., Mendoza served as an assistant district attorney in Brooklyn from 1976-80, assistant U.S. attorney in the Eastern District, and federal district judge in the Eastern District [1.9].
• He has ruled that the state has no right to interfere with same-sex marriages and has the broadest possible interpretation of free speech; his rulings have been upheld by the Court of Appeals more than any other district judge in the country [1.9].
• Josh Lyman has said of Mendoza, "He is brilliant, decisive, compassionate, and experienced and if you don't think that he's America's idea of a jurist then you don't have enough faith in Americans" [1.9].
• He was wrongfully arrested in Wesley, Connecticut, for DUI shortly after being nominated to the Supreme Court; Justice Mendoza suffers from chronic persistent hepatitis, a non-progressive form of liver inflammation which prevents him from drinking alcohol. He was released and the whole matter was kept quiet by the White House [1.15].
• His confirmation process was supervised by Toby Ziegler [1.9], and was ultimately successful [1.18].