jk sides with liberal jurists

I disagreed with Justice Scalia on Raich v Gonzales, now I have to side with Justices Souter, Breyer, Ginsburg, and Stevens against my hero, Justice Thomas.

Law.com - Gimme an 'S': The High Court's Grammatical Divide

Justice Clarence Thomas, writing for the Court (and joined by Chief Justice John Roberts Jr. and Justices Samuel Alito Jr., Anthony Kennedy and Antonin Scalia), concluded that the Kansas statute was not unconstitutional. In reaching this conclusion, Thomas repeatedly referred to the relevant law as Kansas' statute.

In response, Justice David Souter wrote a dissent that was joined by Justices Stephen Breyer, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and John Paul Stevens. The dissent revealed Souter's bitter disagreement with both the substantive conclusion of the majority and the grammatical philosophy of the opinion's author. Whereas Thomas apparently believes that whenever a singular noun ends in "s," an additional "s" should never be placed after the apostrophe, Souter has made equally clear his conviction that an "s" should always be added after the apostrophe when forming a singular possessive, regardless of whether the nonpossessive form already ends in "s."

I'm a Stunk & White guy (hence, cannot jump) and the first rule as I recall was to always add apostrophe-s except for Moses' and Jesus’' (a computer trade magazine suggested adding Gates')

Hat-tip: Taranto, who adds more complexity from the WSJ style guide.

SCOTUS Posted by John Kranz at October 19, 2006 5:17 PM