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\"The rule of law has weathered many threats, but it remains sturdy. I hope and expect that the Court will retain its authority, an authority that my stories have shown was hard-won. But that authority, like the rule of law, depends on trust, a trust that the Court is guided by legal principle, not politics,\" Breyer said.
The justice waded into the debate just as the court reaches the pinnacle of its term and prepares to hand down more than a dozen major opinions. The remarks were also notable because of the spotlight on Breyer and whether he might soon decide to retire. The 82-year-old justice made no mention of his future in the speech.
Breyer has long been an outspoken defender of the Supreme Court as a nonpartisan institution and bristled at the labels of 'liberal' and 'conservative' that many commentators and the media affix to individual justices. He argues that differences among the justices are a matter of legal philosophy and textual interpretation -- not politics.
\"The Court’s decision in the 2000 presidential election case, Bush v. Gore, is often referred to as an example of its favoritism of conservative causes,\" Breyer said, \"But the Court did not hear or decide cases that affected the political disagreements arising out of the 2020 (Trump v. Biden) election.\"
Breyer noted that a so-called \"conservative\" court upheld Obamacare, affirmed abortion rights, and blocked controversial policies advanced by former President Donald Trump, including the addition of a citizenship question to the 2020 census.
\"At the same time,\" he added, \"it made other decisions that can reasonably understood as favoring 'conservative' policies and disfavoring 'liberal' policies.\"
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