Cub fan and Washington Post columnist George F. Will wrote an outstanding profile this weekend of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas that highlights last year’s series of dissents targeting the administrative state. Here’s how it starts:
As the administrative state distorts the United States’ constitutional architecture, Clarence Thomas becomes America’s indispensable constitutionalist. Now in his 25th year on the Supreme Court, he is urging the judicial branch to limit the legislative branch’s practice of delegating its power to the executive branch.
In four opinions in 112 days between March 9 and June 29, Thomas indicted the increasing incoherence of the court’s separation of powers jurisprudence. This subject is central to today’s argument between constitutionalists and progressives. The former favor and the latter oppose holding Congress to its responsibilities and restricting executive discretion.
Read the whole thing. Will’s piece highlights a much longer essay in National Affairs by former Assistant Attorney General Chuck Cooper that is itself well worth reading.