Orrin Hatch Quotes

No matter how badly senators want to know things, judicial nominees are limited in what they may discuss. That limitation is real, and it comes from the very nature of what judges do.

Justice Sandra Day O'Connor serves as a model Supreme Court justice, widely recognized as a jurist with practical values, a sense of the consequences of the legal decisions being made by the Supreme Court.

Much more may a judge overweigh himself in cruelty than in clemency.

I respect people who feel things passionately. I do. But when someone is a judge, that is not what they should bring to the bench. It is not really passion, except in rare instances, that serves the bench well. It is, rather, an ability to understand the law and follow it.

I might disagree with the way the court modifies one of my opinions but I will keep that to myself. I don’t think it is a proper role for a retired supreme court justice to comment on current decisions. What I think doesn’t matter any more.

Judges are terrible politicians.

My personal opinions on any subject are really not relevant, not important, and to the extent that I might inject them, I am acting improperly as either a District Court judge or as an appellate court judge.

The indispensible judicial requisite is intellectual humility.

Knowing that religion does not furnish grosser bigots than law, I expect little from old judges.

It's something, since the nomination and confirmation hearings of Justice Ginsberg, that's really become kind of an unwritten rule, this "I can't answer a question if it's a potential issue that's going to come before me on the Supreme Court." I think that most senators have come to accept that as a very legitimate answer. They don't love it, they're not happy, but it is legitimate when you put it in that context.

We have to respect that any nominee to the Supreme Court would have to defer any comments on any matters which are either before the court or very likely to be before the court.

Because judges may not issue advisory opinions, judicial nominees may not do so either, especially on issues likely to come before the court. That rule has always been honored.

When Judge Ruth Bader Ginsburg was before us in 1993, she said that her standard was to give no hints, no forecasts, no previews, and declined to answer dozens of questions.

We must apply a judicial, not a political, standard to this record. Asking a judicial nominee whose side you will be on in future cases is a political standard.

The authority of the Supreme Court must not be permitted to control the Congress or the Executive when acting in their legislative capacities, but to have only such influence as the force of their reasoning may deserve.

Judge [Samuel] Alito has a reputation for being an exceptional and honest judge devoted to the rule of law, as well as being a man of integrity.

How is it appropriate for a judge ever to say that they will choose to see some facts and not others?

We must remember that we have to make judges out of men, and that by being made judges their prejudices are not diminished and their intelligence is not increased.

It's always an uphill battle to defeat a Supreme Court nominee, but this is a fight worth having.

Supreme Court nominees should know that this exercise of judicial restraint is the key ingredient of being good judge, as the Constitution constrains judges every bit as much as it constrains we legislators, executives and citizens in their actions.

I was pleased to see that Chief Justice [John] Roberts refused to prejudge issues or make promises in exchange for confirmation votes. We're all better off because of his principled stand.

I don't like to see facts twisted, untruths fabricated to give the [Supreme Court] nominee a black eye, even before he comes before Senate committee.

I wouldn't pick a judge who said that the Pledge of Allegiance couldn't be said in a school because it had the words 'under God'' in it. I think that's an example of a judge allowing personal opinion to enter into the decision-making process, as opposed to strict interpretation of the Constitution.

A Judge may be a farmer; but he is not to geld his own pigs.

When a court goes too far, it actually weakens our respect for judicial institutions.