He’s familiar with the “report”

We haven’t gotten around to noting yesterday’s New York Times story on by John Broder and Carolyn Marshall on John Roberts: “In Reagan’s White House, a clever, sometimes cocky John Roberts.” For those like us who have been trying to get a fix on Judge Roberts, the article is helpful. Here’s the beauty part:

There was…the time he offered a snide analysis, in an internal White House memorandum, of a proposal from a member of the House, Elliott H. Levitas. After the Supreme Court struck down efforts by Congress to veto actions taken by the executive branch, Mr. Levitas, a Democrat from Georgia, proposed that the White House and Congress convene a “conference on power-sharing” to codify the duties of each branch of government.
Asked to comment on the congressman’s proposal, Mr. Roberts mocked the idea, and him. “There already has, of course, been a ‘Conference on Power Sharing,'” Mr. Roberts wrote in a memo to Mr. Fielding. “It took place in Philadelphia’s Constitution Hall in 1787, and someone should tell Levitas about it and the ‘report’ it issued.”

Judge Roberts’s analysis is not only funny. To borrow Henry Kissinger’s formulation, it has the additional advantage of being true. Moreover, I’m getting the feeling that Judge Roberts does not view the report as an “organic” document. (Thanks to No Left Turns.)

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