Media Bias Goes to Washington

In a new piece from the Washington Post, attention is drawn to the effects of the tech revolution on modern justice. In it, the effects of widely available media on the decisions and dissenting opinions of the SCOTUS are drawn into question. The transgressions of the justices are laid out in detail, as the court justices increasingly find support for their arguments outside of information presented within the case itself; justices on both sides of the political spectrum are equally guilty. While there aren't rules for how statements must be researched, the ramifications of finding sources that may be wrong or improperly researched in supreme court decisions are indeed worrisome. The Post quotes Allison Orr Larson, a William & Mary Law School Professor in saying “If the justices want more empirical support for a factual dimension of their argument, they can find it easily and without the help of anyone outside of the Supreme Court building[.]”

It's a conundrum of sorts. In merging the ability to use super advanced technology built around quick algorithmic sorting of news and info-sites with a group of elderly law scholars in robes, we create legal decisions as plugged into the times as your average smart phone. I fear however, that this may cause our justices to get their information (and potentially decisions) from sources that may be biased or too far in line with that justices views. If a rift in the justices along partisan lines is allowed to deepen or entrench itself, the court will lose its flexibility that is key to the functions of the court. Furthermore, by basing case decisions off of evidence that wasn't presented within the given case, perhaps the core issue at hand could get lost in the shuffle of clerical data-crunching and the personal desires of the justice. One of America's greatest virtues is the system of justice we maintain and ensure all of our citizens; I hope it can remain enured to the bias-catering of the media.