Wow, I’m sure glad that a conservative justice didn’t make this gaffe, or we’d never hear the end of it.
At oral argument today, Justice Kagan twice addressed Theane Evangelis, counsel for the City of Grants Pass, as “Ms. Kapur” (or, as the transcript puts it, “Ms. Capoor”). In the briefs in the case, Evangelis identifies herself as “Theane D. Evangelis,” and the Supreme Court’s argument list identifies her that way as well.
It appears that years ago Evangelis identified herself professionally under her married name of Theane Evangelis Kapur, but she evidently stopped using her married name after she divorced her husband more than a decade ago.
Kagan’s mistake was surely an innocent one—I’m guessing that she must have come to know Evangelis when she was married—but I can barely imagine the tsunami of criticism that a conservative justice would receive for a similar innocent mistake.