Scalia, Antonin

Scalia, Antonin
born March 11, 1936, Trenton, N.J., U.S.

U.S. jurist.

He studied at Georgetown University and Harvard Law School, where he edited its law review. Successively, he worked for a Cleveland law firm (1961–67), taught at the University of Virginia (1967–74), served as an assistant U.S. attorney general (1974–77), and taught at the University of Chicago (1977–82). He was appointed by Pres. Ronald Reagan to the U.S. Court of Appeals (1982) and then to the Supreme Court of the United States (1986). Among the court's most outspoken justices, he quickly earned a reputation for aggressive oral argument and scathingly critical written opinions, especially when expressing dissenting views. An opponent of "judicial activism," he favoured a restrained judiciary, deference to the original intent of the framers in constitutional interpretation, and a limited role for the federal government.

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▪ United States jurist
born March 11, 1936, Trenton, New Jersey, U.S.

      associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1986, well known for his strong legal conservatism. He was the first Supreme Court justice of Italian ancestry.

      Scalia's father, a Sicilian immigrant, taught Romance languages at Brooklyn College, and his Italian American mother taught elementary school. Scalia received a Roman Catholic parochial education in New York City and graduated at the top of his class from Georgetown University (A.B., 1957) in Washington, D.C. He attended Harvard Law School, where he edited the prestigious Harvard Law Review, graduating in 1960. He then worked for a law firm in Cleveland, Ohio (1961–67), before moving to Charlottesville, Virginia, where he taught at the University of Virginia Law School (1967–74). During his tenure at Virginia, he served the federal government as counsel to the Office of Telecommunications Policy (1971–72) and as chairman of the Administrative Conference of the United States (1972–74). In 1974 Scalia left academia to serve as assistant attorney general in the Office of Legal Counsel of the U.S. Department of Justice.

      Scalia resumed his academic career at the University of Chicago Law School, where he taught from 1977 to 1982. During that period he was editor of Regulation, a review published by the conservative American Enterprise Institute. In 1982 President Ronald Reagan (Reagan, Ronald W.) appointed him to the U.S. Court of Appeals (United States Court of Appeals) for the District of Columbia Circuit. Appointed by Reagan to the Supreme Court in 1986, he won unanimous confirmation in the U.S. Senate.

      Among the court's most passionate and outspoken justices, Scalia quickly earned a reputation for aggressiveness in oral argument and scathing criticism in written opinions, especially when expressing dissenting views. This tendency was especially apparent in cases involving abortion, which Scalia vehemently opposed. In Webster v. Reproductive Health Services (1989), for example, he admonished his fellow conservatives for failing to strike down Roe v. Wade (1973), which had established the right to abortion; and in a dissent to Madsen v. Women's Health Center (1994), in which the court ruled 6–3 that “buffer zones” around abortion clinics did not violate the free-speech rights of abortion opponents, he asserted that the court's ruling “departs so far from the established course of our jurisprudence that in any other context it would have been regarded as a candidate for summary reversal.”

      Scalia was unwavering in his opinions as well as in his general approach to constitutional law. An opponent of “judicial activism,” the alleged tendency of some judges to usurp the power of elected legislatures by making the law rather than merely interpreting it, Scalia favoured a restrained judiciary, deference to the original intent of the framers in constitutional interpretation, and a limited role for the federal government. His originalism was illustrated by his view of the Eighth Amendment's prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment, which he claimed must be understood relative to the standards of justice applicable in the late 18th century. Although sometimes portrayed as unusual, his decisions also were noted for their logic and consistency. According to Scalia, the same freedom of speech that belongs to abortion opponents also extends to those who would desecrate the American flag. In his dissent in Edwards v. Aguilard (1987), in which the court struck down Louisiana's Balanced Treatment for Creation-Science and Evolution-Science in Public School Instruction Act, Scalia argued that original or legislative intent should govern judicial decisions when it is discoverable and apparently unambiguous, as he believed it was in this case. On the limited role of government, Scalia led a sharply divided court in striking down key provisions of the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act, arguing on the basis of states' rights in Printz v. United States (1997) that the federal government could not require state and local law-enforcement agencies to perform background checks on prospective gun owners. His credentials as a conservative justice were illustrated in Lawrence v. Texas (2003), in which the court struck down a Texas antisodomy law as an unconstitutional invasion of privacy; in a dissent read from the bench, Scalia criticized his colleagues for taking “sides in the culture war” and for signing on to “the so-called homosexual agenda.”

      Although Scalia's views often elicited fierce criticism from scholars of constitutional law, he was nevertheless regarded as one of the court's leading intellects, and his opinions were considered among the best written in the Supreme Court's long history.

Brian P. Smentkowski
 

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Universalium. 2010.

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  • Scalia,Antonin — Sca·li·a (skə lēʹə), Antonin. Born 1936. American jurist who was appointed an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court in 1986. * * * …   Universalium

  • Scalia, Antonin — (n. 11 mar. 1936, Trenton, N.J., EE.UU.). Jurista estadounidense. Estudió en la Universidad de Georgetown y en la escuela de derecho de la Universidad de Harvard, donde editaba su revista de derecho. Sucesivamente, trabajó para un estudio… …   Enciclopedia Universal

  • Antonin Scalia — (* 11. März 1936 in Trenton, New Jersey) ist ein US amerikanischer Jurist und seit 1986 beigeordneter Richter (Associate Justice) am Obersten Gerichtshof der Vereinigten Staaten (Supreme Cou …   Deutsch Wikipedia

  • Antonin Scalia — Saltar a navegación, búsqueda Antonin Gregory Scalia Juez Asociado de la Corte Suprema de los Estados Unidos …   Wikipedia Español

  • Antonin Scalia — Infobox Judge name = Antonin Gregory Scalia imagesize = caption = office = Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court termstart = September 26 1986 termend = nominator = Ronald Reagan appointer = predecessor = William H. Rehnquist… …   Wikipedia

  • Antonin Scalia — Pour les articles homonymes, voir Scalia. Antonin Scalia Mandats …   Wikipédia en Français

  • Antonin — (as used in expressions) Artaud Antonin Raymond Antonin Scalia Antonin * * * …   Universalium

  • Antonin — (as used in expressions) Artaud, Antonin Raymond, Antonin Scalia, Antonin …   Enciclopedia Universal

  • Scalia — ist der Name folgender Personen: Antonin Scalia (* 1936), US amerikanischer Jurist und seit 1986 beisitzender Richter (associate justice) am Supreme Court Jack Scalia (* 1950), US amerikanischer Schauspieler Pietro Scalia (* 1960), italienischer… …   Deutsch Wikipedia

  • Scalia — [skə lē′ə] Antonin [an′tə nin] 1936 ; U.S. jurist: associate justice, Supreme Court (1986 ) …   English World dictionary

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