Scalia: State of the Union 'a childish spectacle'

WASHINGTON -- Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia criticized the annual State of the Union ritual Tuesday night, calling the presidential speech something worth skipping because it is a "rather silly affair."

One of three justices who did not attend President Obama's speech at the U.S. Capitol -- along with Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito -- Scalia bemoaned that "it has turned into a childish spectacle, and I don't think that I want to be there to lend dignity to it."

"The State of the Union is not something I write on my calendar," Scalia said during his own remarks before the Smithsonian Associates at George Washington University. But he quipped, "I didn't set this up tonight just to upstage the president."

Scalia's views are shared by Chief Justice John Roberts and Alito, both nominated to the bench by President George W. Bush. Roberts once said the presidential speech has "denigrated into a political pep rally" and added that it was "troubling" to expect members of the high court to sit there expressionless.

Indeed, Alito was seen on TV cameras during Obama's 2010 remarks shaking his head and mouthing the words "not true" when the president criticized the high court's ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, which upheld the right of corporations and unions to make unlimited, independent political expenditures.

Next to a presidential inauguration, the State of the Union Address has similar stagecraft and drama. The president speaks before a joint session of Congress, and the justices, Cabinet members, foreign diplomats and assorted guests are in attendance in the packed House chambers.

Scalia, the Supreme Court's senior member and a Ronald Reagan appointee, noted that it's not uncommon for justices to skip the event. William Rehnquist often did not attend toward the end of his tenure as chief justice, he said, and former associate justice John Paul Stevens never showed up. Scalia confirmed he has not attended since 1997.

During an hour-long interview with National Public Radio legal correspondent Nina Totenberg before a packed house, the 76-year-old jurist also expounded on hats, hunting and his legacy decision in District of Columbia v. Heller, which upheld the right to possess firearms for self-defense.

Asked if the Second Amendment's right to bear arms is as unequivocal as the First Amendment's right to free speech, Scalia said, "We're going to find out, aren't we?" -- an indication he expects the court to hear a gun rights case in the near future.

"There are doubtless limits (on gun rights), but what they are, we will see," Scalia said.

He recalled carrying a .22-caliber rifle, used for target competition, on the New York City subway as a student and lamented that today, guns are most frequently associated with crime.

Scalia heralded his ruling in Heller as his most important opinion, calling it "the most complete, originalist opinion that I've ever written."

Mixing quips and quotes with his views of the Constitution, Scalia drew laughs by describing his choice of unusual hats, his hunting excursions with Associate Justice Elena Kagan and his home life, which includes nine children and 33 grandchildren.

Hunting for antelope and mule deer in Wyoming with the liberal Kagan, he joked that all she landed was a whitetail doe -- "which she could have done in my driveway."

And noting that he doesn't run the show at home with his wife Maureen, he said, "I take care of the Constitution; she takes care of everything else. That's the deal."