Supreme Court should be balance with non-elite members

The United States Supreme Court recently heard arguments in the case of City of Ontario v. Quon. At issue in the case is whether public employees who receive text messages on their government issued devices can expect their messages to not be viewed by the government. Unfortunately, precedent that it will establish takes a backseat to what the oral arguments told us about the Court itself.

During the oral arguments, the justices asked questions that revealed just how insular the high court is. Chief Justice John Roberts asked what the difference was between a pager and email. Justice Anthony Kennedy was confused about what happens when one sends a text message while receiving a text message. And Justice Scalia asked if "Quon could print these spicy little conversations and send them to his buddies"? This line of questioning offers a clear illustration of how detached and aloof our Supreme Court is. It isn't just that the justices didn't know certain things that most people know. It's that most of them come from the same circles and have no real experience outside of its elite confines.

The Chief Justice is a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law and served on the D.C. Court of Appeals before being confirmed to the high court. Scalia also went to Harvard Law and served on the Federal Court of Appeals before joining the Supreme Court. In fact, all of the justices, excepting the retiring John Paul Stevens, went to Ivy League law schools. And all of the current justices have served on the Federal Court of Appeals. Former Justice O'Connor served in the Arizona State Senate for a time and Justice Ginsburg worked for the ACLU's women's project. Those sorts of backgrounds offer unique perspectives on the society for which the court decides the constitutionality of certain laws.

This past January in the case Citizens United v. Federal Elections Commission the Court ruled 5-4 that corporations had the right to spend unlimited amounts of money on political advertisments. This ruling jettisoned decades of precedence and will give corporations an ability to influence our elections. A lot of the justices often socialize with corporate titans and would naturally have an affinity for them. And in 2007 the Court, which only had one female justice at the time, ruled 5-4 in Ledbetter v. Goodyear that a woman had only 180 days to file an equal pay discrimination complaint, even if she became aware of the discrimination after the 180 day cycle. Such rulings show a Supreme Court that has no connection to most of America. They don't allow cameras inside the Supreme Court chamber and some of the justices refuse to allow the press to cover their rare public appearances. Moreover, the justices serve life terms and aren't responsible to anyone.

When Barack Obama ran for President, he promised to appoint justices that had real life experiences, people who are capable of empathizing with regular Americans. Sonia Sotomayor fit that bill, for the most part, because of her lower–middle class upbringing in New York City. Even she, however, served on the D.C. Court of Appeals and went to Ivy League schools. The retirement of Justice Stevens presents the President with an opportunity to appoint someone who is truly unique. The President can send a message to thousands of law students that they too can serve on Supreme Court someday by appointing someone who didn't graduate from an Ivy League institution. Instead, he could appoint a politician like Earl Warren, who helped usher in the most progressive Court in the nation's history. Unfortunately, the resumes of Obama's potential appointees don't match the rhetoric he himself used when he spoke of appointing someone who would protect the ordinary citizen.

In the next couple of years, the Supreme Court is likely to hear important cases. Obama will be doing himself, and the nation, a great service if he lived up to his rhetoric and appointed someone whose experiences and life are unique and who will protect the ordinary citizen.