Supreme Court Judge Justice Scalia Is Dead at 79

choi

Adam Liptak, Justice Scalia, Who Led Court’s Conservative Renaissance, Dies At 79. New York Times, Feb 14, 2016 (front-page top report)
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/14/us/antonin-scalia-death.html
("Young Antonin [Scalia (1936-2016)] was an exceptional student, graduating * * * first in his class at Georgetown and magna cum laude at Harvard Law School [1960; as Sheldon Fellow of Harvard University (1960-1961), he traveled throughout Europe: Wikipedia].  He practiced law [at law firm Jones, Day (1961-1967)] for six years in Cleveland before accepting a position teaching law at the University of Virginia in 1967 [until 1971, for four years. Then he was government lawyers at three agencies, 1971-1977.] * * * In 1977, Mr Scalia returned to the legal academy, now joining the law faculty at the University of Chicago. * * * [President Ron Reagan nominated him and he became a judge at DC Circuit (1982-1986, when he was elevated to Supreme Court)]")

Quote:

(a) "He [Scalia] appeared to enjoy intellectual give-and-take from the bench [while serving at DC Circuit], with his colleagues and in his chambers. On the appeals court and in his early years on the Supreme Court, he would hire one liberal law clerk each year to keep discussions lively.

" 'He made it a point of telling me that I was his token liberal,' said E Joshua Rosenkranz, who served as a law clerk for Judge Scalia in 1986, his last year on the appeals court. 'To his credit, I’m sure it was largely because he wanted to be sure he always heard the arguments against the positions he was taking.'

(b) "Justice Scalia’s appetite for the sort of discussion and debate he enjoyed as a law professor was not sated by the brisk conferences the [Supreme Court] justices held after oral arguments. Under Chief Justice Rehnquist and to a lesser extent under Chief Justice Roberts, they can consist of little more than a tally of votes.

" 'I don't like that,' Justice Scalia said after a speech at George Washington University in 1988. 'Maybe it’s just because I’m new. Maybe it’s because I’m an ex-academic. Maybe it’s because I’m right.”

"In a C-Span interview in 2009, Justice Scalia reflected on his role and legacy, sketching out a modest conception of the role of a Supreme Court justice.

" 'We don’t sit here to make the law, to decide who ought to win,' Justice Scalia said. 'We decide who wins under the law that the people [as embodied in Congress] have adopted. And very often, if you’re a good judge, you don't really like the result you’re reaching.'

My comment:
(a) There is no need to read the rest, which is about Scalia's philosophy in the eyes of New York Times.
(b) Scalia was 100% Italian (his father was a first-generation Italian American, hailing from Sicily). And yet * * *
(i) Antonin
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonin
(Antonin is a French first name from Latin Antoninus)
(ii) The Southern Italian surname Scalia: "from Scalea in Cosenza province, named with medieval Greek skaleia 'hoeing' "

(c) The Dutch, German/Jewish, and Scandinavian surname Rosenkranz is "from Middle Low German rosenkranz 'wreath,' [or] 'rosary.' "