In the due course of my reading today (monday being my new marathon reading day,) I realized there are certain judges opinions that I really really look forward to reading. It is not that I necessarily agree with them. Far from it at times, some I completely disagree with. But yet, when I see their names on one of my cases, I often find myself grinning, in spite of myself. These men and women just have something special about their opinions that I actually WANT to read what they say. Here are a few of my favorites:

1. Justice Antonin Scalia - the highly conservative, highly opinionated, potentially next cheif justice of the Supreme Court. While I almost NEVER agree with what he says, he writes very persuasive arguements. At least he has some sort of laws that back up his arguements. Something that the more "liberal" members, whom I often agree with, seem to lack. Really folks, the pneumbra of privacy was something that was made up by the court in the first place. Let's not pretend it is in the damn Constitution. Make your clerks work harder and find something in the Constitution that actually justifies what you want to happen, or get an amendment that lets you do it.

2. Judge Alex Kozinski - ringmaster of the circus that is the 9th circuit, Kozinski is notorious for his wry wit in his opinions. Case in point: In his opinion on Mattel's suit against Aqua for their song "Barbie Girl" Kozinski noted that the 1950s barbie looked like a "German street walker" and stated "The parties are advised to chill." Yah gotta love opinions like that...

3. Judge Benjamin Cardozo - one of the great common law judges, Cardozo is known to first year law students for writing the opinion to Murphy v. Steeplechase Amusement Co, otherwise known as "The Flopper" case. In a bit of sarcasm about the healthy young man who broke his arm on the ride that made him fall, he noted "The timorous should stay at home." A judge using logic. Who knew?

4. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg - a good friend of Scalia, Ginsburg often writes clear and logical opinions. "Here is why I am writing my opinion. Are you listening lower courts? Don't try to pretend I wrote something else. This is what I mean." Granted, it leaves little leeway for lower courts to mess with, but I am pretty much ok with that.

5. Judge Learned Hand - ok, the guy's name is Learned Hand. That alone makes him interesting. But his theory of economics in the law (specifically torts), while annoying at times, made a hell of a lot of sense, and was one of the first real concepts I grasped in law school. The Hand law was applied to EVERYTHING we did in Torts, and made a pretty good model to work off of.


Any others that people like better? Or maybe people don't think of such things, and I am just a dork. **sigh**