Ketanji Brown Jackson Says She Uses Supreme Court Opinions To Express Her Feelings

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson said during her book tour last weekend that she views Supreme Court opinions as a way to voice her personal convictions.

“I just feel that I have a wonderful opportunity to tell people in my opinions how I feel about the issues, and that’s what I try to do,” Jackson said.

She made the comments during a discussion of her new memoir, “Lovely One,” in front of 4,000 attendees at the Essence Festival of Culture in New Orleans.

Jackson’s conception of her role appears to differ from that of most Supreme Court justices.

The justice “apparently has a fundamental disagreement with the rest of the court about what the role of a Supreme Court justice is,” Scott Jennings, former director of political affairs for George W. Bush, said in a CNN interview on Wednesday.

“People from the ideological right and the ideological left on the court have had to put her in her place a couple of times here in this term. I would guess internally it’s causing issues at the Supreme Court,” he added.

This tension has become evident in recent rulings. In June, the Supreme Court ruled 6-3 against universal injunctions, which federal courts were using to block President Donald Trump’s executive orders. Justice Jackson filed her own dissent.

“I write separately to emphasize a key conceptual point: The Court’s decision to permit the Executive to violate the Constitution with respect to anyone who has not yet sued is an existential threat to the rule of law,” she stated.

Justice Amy Coney Barrett slammed Jackson in the majority opinion, saying that “She offers a vision of the judicial role that would make even the most ardent defender of judicial supremacy blush.”

“​​We will not dwell on Justice Jackson’s argument, which is at odds with more than two centuries’ worth of precedent, not to mention the Constitution itself,” Barrett concluded. “We observe only this: Justice Jackson decries an imperial Executive while embracing an imperial Judiciary.”

Jackson was notably the only dissenter in a ruling on Tuesday enabling the Trump administration to continue mass government layoffs per a February executive order. Though the court order took up less than two pages, her dissent ran 15 pages long.

The Heritage Foundation’s Hans von Spakovsky told The Daily Wire this week that “Jackson is really at the far end of the spectrum,” and that her colleagues — including the other liberal justices — “are getting tired of her.”

Reminiscing about her childhood during another book promotion at the Kennedy Center, Jackson said her mother “wanted me to get out there and use my voice,” and that she’d enrolled Jackson in public speaking classes starting in elementary school.

Despite being the youngest and newest justice, having been nominated by President Joe Biden in 2022, Jackson speaks more than any of her colleagues. Since October, she has spoken 50% more words than the next most vocal justice, Sonia Sotomayor, according to a report by Empirical SCOTUS.

She was also in the majority the least often this term, and wrote more — including opinions, dissents, and concurrences — than any of the other justices except for Clarence Thomas.

“There are some times when, even after the principal dissent is written, I have a slightly different perspective or a different take on something or this is an issue of particular importance to me,” she said.

“I will say, ‘Forgive me, Justice Sotomayor, but I need to write on this case,’ and it’s because I feel like I might have something to offer and something to add, and I’m not afraid to use my voice.”