Justice Antonin Scalia is shedding little light on the Supreme Court’s deliberations over President Barack Obama’s health care law, but the court’s longest-serving justice did deny in an interview aired Wednesday night that he had a “falling out” with Chief Justice John Roberts over his decision to join with the court’s liberal members to uphold a central part of the law. 
 
 “No, I haven’t had a falling out with Justice Roberts,” Scalia said, when asked about press accounts that some Republican-appointed justices were angry with Roberts after he reportedly switched sides to uphold the individual mandate in the Affordable Care Act. 
 
 Text Size - 
 
 + 
 
 reset 
 
 “Loud words exchanged, slamming of doors?” CNN host Piers Morgan asked Scalia. 
 
 “No, no. … nothing like that,” the justice replied. 
 
 “Best buddies?” Morgan asked. 
 
 “My best buddy on the court is Ruth Bader Ginsburg — has always been,” Scalia said. 
 
 While Scalia offered no warm words for Roberts, the Reagan-appointed justice and conservative legal mind denied in general terms that his colleagues are prone to personal infighting. 
 
 “There are clashes on legal questions but not personally,” Scalia said. “The press likes to paint us as nine scorpions in a bottle. That’s just not the case.” 
 
 Scalia also denounced anonymously sourced reports purporting to offer insight into the court’s internal discussions. 
 
 “You should not believe what you read about the court in the newspapers because the information has either been made up or given to the newspapers by somebody who is violating a confidence, which means that person is not reliable,” Scalia said. 
 
 Viewers hoping for the inside story of the court’s deliberations learned early in the broadcast that they were likely to be disappointed. 
 
 “The justice is not going to comment on cases that were just ruled on or are pending,” Morgan said at the outset of the interview. Morgan was more specific later in the program, saying that Scalia had indicated he would not “discuss anything in the last session.” 
 
 However, some of Scalia’s comments seemed to have relevance to the high-profile health care case in which the court, on a 5-4 vote, effectively saved Obama’s signature legislative achievement. 
 
 Asked how he handles defeat in a major case, Scalia said: “I probably mutter something under my breath. …You play the hand you’re dealt. You can’t take it personally.” 
 
 Most of the interview, kicking off a publicity tour related to Scalia’s new book, “Reading Law: The Interpretation of Legal Texts,” was devoted to other major cases he has taken part in and to his overall judicial philosophy. ||||| Story highlights CNN's Piers Morgan interviews Justice Antonin Scalia 
 
 Scalia says he was dismayed by recent criticism of Chief Justice John Roberts 
 
 "I'm not 'pro' death penalty," he says, arguing that it should be a democratic choice 
 
 The conservative jurist has argued for state sovereignty in several major cases 
 
 U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia downplayed reports of personal and ideological rifts stemming from the recent landmark health care reform ruling, telling CNN in an exclusive interview "it offends me" to hear criticism of his colleagues over how they ruled. 
 
 The 76-year-old justice talked Wednesday with CNN's "Piers Morgan Tonight," discussing a range of judicial topics -- from the death penalty to abortion rights and the Bush v. Gore decision. 
 
 Scalia, along with Bryan Garner, is co-author of a new book, "Reading Law: The Interpretation of Legal Texts." The men describe their legal philosophy, and how to make sense of the law and the U.S. Constitution. They call their approach "textualism." 
 
 Even in dissent, Scalia stirs controversy 
 
 Scalia would not specifically address the health care decision or other recent or current case issues, such as immigration enforcement, affirmative action or gay marriage. 
 
 And he would not discuss how the court reached its health care ruling in internal deliberations. But the conservative justice downplayed media reports of personal fallout from opposing conservative and liberal members of the court over the 5-4 decision three weeks ago. 
 
 JUST WATCHED Scalia: Roe v. Wade theory not sound Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Scalia: Roe v. Wade theory not sound 03:08 
 
 JUST WATCHED Scalia: Judicial critics offend me Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Scalia: Judicial critics offend me 01:03 
 
 JUST WATCHED Scalia: I'm not a king Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Scalia: I'm not a king 01:56 
 
 JUST WATCHED Scalia jokes about hunting with Cheney Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH Scalia jokes about hunting with Cheney 01:35 
 
 Scalia was on the losing side of the ruling upholding the Affordable Care Act, the sweeping legislation championed by President Barack Obama. 
 
 Chief Justice John Roberts was the deciding vote in that decision, agreeing with his liberal colleagues to uphold the individual mandate, which would financially punish people who do not purchase health insurance. 
 
 Some media and blog reports -- citing sources with specific knowledge of the deliberation process -- suggested strong tensions among the court's conservatives over Roberts' vote, which some commentators perceived as political expediency. 
 
 But Scalia said it was wrong to question Roberts or other court members personally for their legal conclusions. 
 
 "We are not a political institution," Scalia said. "I don't think any of my colleagues on any cases vote the way they do for political reasons." 
 
 Scalia added he was dismayed at the criticism of Roberts, suggesting those who may have leaked information were not entirely privy to the internal discussions over the health care decision. 
 
 On abortion, Scalia said the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision legalizing the medical procedure should be overturned, believing it remains an issue best left for states to decide. 
 
 No matter what it does, high court is seen as political 
 
 The court doesn't do democracy any favors by getting involved in the abortion debate in such a way, according to Scalia. 
 
 Likewise with capital punishment, Scalia said the issue is not whether the court should ultimately decide whether there should still be a death penalty -- he claimed not to have an opinion on that -- but rather whether individual states should decide such a question. 
 
 "If you don't like the death penalty, fine, change the law," he said. "I'm not 'pro' death penalty, I'm 'anti' the idea that is not ultimately a democratic choice." 
 
 But he emphasized capital punishment has been around since the nation's founding and was well-established in law and social tradition. 
 
 And Scalia reiterated his firm views over what he agreed was the most talked-about recent court decision -- the 2000 ruling effectively handing the presidency to George W. Bush after the Florida ballot recounts. 
 
 "Get over it," he said about supporters of Al Gore, many of whom are still convinced the case was wrongly decided in favor of the Republican. "He (Gore) would have lost anyway if all the ballots were recounted." 
 
 In his new book, Scalia argues interpreting laws and the Constitution properly requires a strict approach to look at the actual text of the law itself. 
 
 He warns that squishy, unprincipled decision-making is bad for the country and for the reputation of judges themselves. 
 
 "The descent into social rancor over judicial decisions is largely traceable to nontextual means of interpretation, which erodes society's confidence in a rule of law that evidently has no agreed-upon meaning," write Scalia and Garner. 
 
 The jaunty jurist has long been able to light up, or ignite, a room with his often brash demeanor and wicked sense of humor, and he displayed that in the hourlong conversation with Morgan. 
 
 Despite his reputation as an intellectual fighter, Scalia described himself as "a peaceful man." 
 
 When asked if he had ever broken the law, the justice said, "I've had a few speeding tickets, though none recently." 
 
 His outgoing personality and sharply written opinions have made him among the most recognizable of justices, and a particular favorite of conservative activists, scholars and lawmakers. President Ronald Reagan named Scalia to the high court in 1986 after previous jobs as an appeals court judge, a government and private lawyer, and a law professor. 
 
 Justices finances show overseas travel, book royalties, gifts 
 
 "At one extreme, he can alienate some of his colleagues," said Joan Biskupic, legal affairs editor at Reuters, who has written a biography of Scalia. "If he is trying to get anybody to sign an opinion, it was harder when he would use more combative language. But as much as they would say 'I'd like to strangle Nino,' he was still theirs in many ways." 
 
 That harshness was evident in the closing days of the term ending in June. On two issues that left Scalia on the losing side -- health care and immigration enforcement -- he displayed the fierce rhetoric that has become his trademark. 
 
 Scalia, writing for the minority, argued the court's ruling favoring federal authority over immigration matters encroaches on Arizona's sovereign powers. 
 
 "If securing its territory in this fashion is not within the power of Arizona, we should cease referring to it as a sovereign State." 
 
 "He can be belligerent; he is obviously very candid about how he feels," Biskupic said. "He loves to call it as he sees it, completely not politically correct. In fact, he prides himself on not being PC on the bench, in court." 
 
 Many legal scholars say Scalia ultimately failed to sway his colleagues on the really big constitutional issues, and court sources say he has grown somewhat frustrated over the years being on the losing side of many cases, or not being able to write more majority opinions. 
 
 Antonin Gregory Scalia was born in 1936 and admitted to being the center of attention as the only child, doted on by his father, a Sicilian-born professor of romance languages, and his mother, a schoolteacher. They instilled a love of learning and the confidence to exercise his intellectual muscles. 
 
 He attended Georgetown University as an undergrad, and later Harvard Law School, where he met his future wife, Maureen McCarthy, who was attending nearby Radcliffe. They raised nine children, including a colonel in the U.S. Army Reserve, and a priest. The family is united by a strong Catholic faith. 
 
 When asked about his greatest achievement as a judge, Scalia went back to the foundation of his book. He said he hoped he has moved his colleagues toward a more textured view of the law. 
 
 "The court pays more attention now to the text" of the law and the Constitution, he said, and less to legislative history, congressional floor debates and the views of foreign governments. For a lover of language, the precise meaning of words contained in the law has been his goal. 
 
 And he has no plans to step down anytime soon. 
 
 "Of course, I'll retire when I start to realize I'm not doing as good a job as I should," he said, adding he still thinks he is fully engaged. 
 
 Taking a look at Scalia's influence, defiance ||||| Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, the fiery conservative who used a sharp intellect, barbed wit and a zeal for verbal combat to fight against the tide of modern liberalism, has died. 
 
 Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, the intellectual cornerstone of the court's modern conservative wing, whose elegant and acidic opinions inspired a movement of legal thinkers and ignited liberal critics, died Feb. 13 on a ranch near Marfa, Texas. He was 79. The cause of death was not immediately known. "Justice Antonin Scalia was a man of God, a patriot, and an unwavering defender of the written Constitution and the Rule of Law," Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said in a statement, the first official notice of Scalia's death. "His fierce loyalty to the Constitution set an unmatched example, not just for judges and lawyers, but for all Americans. We mourn his passing, and we pray that his successor on the Supreme Court will take his place as a champion for the written Constitution and the Rule of Law." Scalia, the first Italian American to serve on the court, was nominated by President Ronald Reagan in 1986 and quickly became the kind of champion to the conservative legal world that his benefactor was in the political realm. An outspoken opponent of abortion, affirmative action and what he termed the "so-called homosexual agenda," Scalia's intellectual rigor, flamboyant style and eagerness to debate his detractors energized conservative law students, professors and intellectuals who felt outnumbered by liberals in their chosen professions. "He has by the force and clarity of his opinions become a defining figure in American constitutional law," Northwestern University law professor Steven Calabresi said at a Federalist Society dinner honoring Scalia at the 20-year mark of his service on the Supreme Court. He took his seat Sept. 26, 1986. Scalia was the most prominent advocate of a manner of constitutional interpretation called "originalism," the idea that judges should look to the meaning of the words of the Constitution at the time they were written. Rich in history as well as rugged West Texas landscapes and big sky, the Cibolo Creek Ranch where Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia passed away has long been a secluded retreat for celebrities from business leaders to rock stars and actors. Scalia, 79, was found dead on Saturday morning when... He mocked the notion of a "living" Constitution, one that evolved with changing times, as simply an excuse for judges to impose their own ideological views. Critics countered that the same could be said for originalism - and that the legal conclusions Scalia said were dictated by that approach meshed neatly with the justice's views on the death penalty, gay rights and abortion. It is hard to overstate Scalia's impact on the modern court. Upon his arrival, staid oral arguments before the justices became jousting matches, with Scalia aggressively questioning counsel with whom he disagreed, challenging his colleagues and often dominating the sessions. He asked so many questions in his first sitting as a justice that Justice Lewis Powell whispered to Justice Thurgood Marshall: "Do you think he knows the rest of us are here?" Scalia was just as ready for combat outside the court. He relished debating his critics at law schools and in public appearances, although he sometimes displayed a thin skin. He tired of questions about his prominent role in the court's 2000 decision in Bush v. Gore, which halted a recount of the presidential vote in Florida and effectively decided the presidency for Republican George W. Bush. His response to those who raised questions years later: "Get over it." Despite his impact on the legal world, Scalia's views were too far to the right for him to play the pivotal roles on the court that his fellow Reagan nominees - Sandra Day O'Connor and Anthony Kennedy - eventually assumed. Scalia was far better known for fiery dissents than landmark majority opinions. One exception was the court's groundbreaking 2008 decision in District of Columbia v. Heller. An avid hunter and a member of his high school rifle team, Scalia wrote the court's 5-to-4 ruling that held for the first time that the Second Amendment afforded a right to gun ownership unrelated to military service. "His views on textualism and originalism, his views on the role of judges in our society, on the practice of judging, have really transformed the terms of legal debate in this country," Elena Kagan said about Scalia when she was dean of Harvard Law School, alma mater to both. "He is the justice who has had the most important impact over the years on how we think and talk about law." After Kagan was nominated to the court by President Barack Obama, she and Scalia became friends and hunting buddies - despite their distinct ideological differences and the fact that Kagan had never shot a gun. They went to Wyoming together in 2012 in hopes of Kagan bagging a big-game trophy like the elk, nicknamed Leroy, whose mounted head dominated Justice Scalia's Supreme Court chambers. But she shot only a white-tailed deer, which Justice Scalia later laughingly said "she could have done in my driveway" at his suburban Virginia home. The sudden death of Justice Antonin Scalia will have an immediate impact on numerous cases now pending before the Supreme Court, including several that were expected to split along ideological or political lines with 5-4 votes. Instead, some of those votes now could deadlock, 4 to 4, meaning a... Antonin Gregory Scalia - "Nino" to family, friends and colleagues - was born in Trenton, New Jersey, on March 11, 1936, and grew up in the New York City borough of Queens. His father, Salvatore, came through Ellis Island at 17; he learned English and became a professor of romance languages at Brooklyn College. Scalia's mother, the former Catherine Panaro, was a second-generation Italian American and an elementary school teacher. Not only was Nino their only child, he was the only child of his generation on either side of the family. The whole extended clan doted on him, biographer Joan Biskupic reported in her biography "American Original," and expected achievement. "You're not everybody else," Catherine would say, according to Biskupic. "Your family has standards, and it doesn't matter what the standards of (others) are." In 1953, he graduated first in his class at St. Francis Xavier, a military prep school in Manhattan, and won a naval ROTC scholarship but was turned down by his first choice of college, Princeton. A devout Catholic, he attended his second choice, Georgetown University, where he was the valedictorian of the class of 1957. In his graduation speech, he exhorted his fellow students: "If we will not be leaders of a real, a true, a Catholic intellectual life, no one will!" Scalia then entered Harvard Law School, where he was editor of the law review and graduated magna cum laude in 1960. That same year, he married Maureen McCarthy, a Radcliffe student he'd met on a blind date. She, too, came from a small family, but they made up for it, with five sons and four daughters and literally dozens of grandchildren. "We didn't set out to have nine children," Justice Scalia told Lesley Stahl on the CBS show "60 Minutes." "We're just old-fashioned Catholics, playing what used to be known as 'Vatican Roulette.' " He added that the other four sons were relieved when their brother Paul decided to "take one for the team" and become a priest. 
 
 The Scalias moved around. After traveling across Europe for a year while he was a Harvard Sheldon Fellow, the newlyweds moved to Cleveland, where Scalia joined the Jones Day firm in 1961. On the cusp of becoming partner, he left private practice in 1967 to become a law professor at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville. In 1971, he became general counsel to the new Office of Telecommunications Policy in the Nixon administration; the agency spurred development of the nascent cable industry. From 1972 to 1974, he was chairman of the Administrative Conference of the United States, followed by three years as assistant attorney general for the Office of Legal Counsel. After Jimmy Carter, a Democrat, won election to the White House, Scalia returned to academia as a professor at the University of Chicago law school. Then Reagan came into office in 1981 and the next year nominated Scalia to the influential U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. His name quickly appeared on short lists of potential Supreme Court nominees. Gavin Averill / AP U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Antonin Scalia died Feb. 13, 2016, at age 79 in Texas. U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Antonin Scalia died Feb. 13, 2016, at age 79 in Texas. (Gavin Averill / AP) (Gavin Averill / AP) Reagan in 1981 made good on a campaign promise to appoint the court's first woman with his choice of O'Connor, then an Arizona state judge and former legislator. His next chance to leave an imprint came five years later, when Chief Justice Warren Burger announced that he was stepping down. The president decided to elevate Justice William Rehnquist to the chief's job, and Scalia and fellow D.C. Circuit Judge Robert Bork became the finalists for the opening. Bork was the more experienced jurist and a conservative icon, but the 50-year-old Scalia was almost a decade younger and brought the added political benefit of being Italian American. Scalia got the nomination. After a testy Senate battle over Rehnquist's elevation, Scalia sailed through his confirmation hearings and was approved 98 to 0. Future vice president Joseph Biden, then a Democratic senator from Delaware and a stalwart of the Judiciary Committee, later said that his vote for Scalia was the one he most regretted - "because he was so effective." Scalia set out immediately to make his views known - and became exactly the conservatives had hoped for. He had been an influential early supporter of the Federalist Society, a group that political scientist Steven Teles called "the most vigorous, durable and well-ordered organization to emerge from (the) rethinking of modern conservatism's political strategy." Reliance on legislative history as a key element of interpreting statutes was once commonplace. But Scalia railed against the practice, saying that only the words of the statutes matter - a view known as textualism. He likened judges' use of secondary sources such as committee reports or statements made by members of Congress during floor debates to "looking over the faces of the crowd at a large cocktail party and picking out your friends." Even though most justices continued to think legislative history was valuable in interpreting statutes, lawyers arguing before the court learned that they would be upbraided by Scalia for mentioning it. He refused to join opinions that cited legislative history, even in a footnote. Similarly, Scalia redefined and popularized originalism. His approach to understanding the Constitution focused not on the framers' intent but on the meaning of the words to ordinary citizens in 1787. He rejected the notion that the framers wanted the Constitution to be a "living" document designed to accommodate changing circumstances and social values. Nervous anxiety unexpectedly coursed through the decorous, overflow crowd at the University of Chicago Divinity School late Friday. A stocky black man took to a microphone at a death penalty symposium and confronted a panelist whom he disdains. "You have innocent people on Death Row!" declared... "The starting point, in any case, is the text of the document and what it meant to the society that adopted it,"Scalia said at his confirmation hearing. He added that this approach guarded "against the passions of the moment that may cause individual liberties to be disregarded." Liberals, he said, should like such an approach, because it constrained conservatives such as him from turning their personal opinions into public policy. To illustrate, he often said that the Constitution doesn't provide a right for a woman to have an abortion, but it also does not forbid states from making the procedure legal and accessible. He cited his vote on flag-burning - he agreed with the court's majority that the guarantee of free speech allows the practice - as one instance when his allegiance to the Constitution outweighed his personal views. "If it was up to me, if I were king," he said, "I would take scruffy, bearded, sandal-wearing idiots who burn the flag, and I would put them in jail." But he did not note many other examples of originalism dictating views that contradicted his personal beliefs. Even when he wasn't writing for the majority, his opinions provided an influential template for conservative lawyers and politicians. His writing style was certain and clever: "Frequently an issue of this sort will come before the Court clad, so to speak, in sheep's clothing," Scalia wrote in his lone dissent in Morrison v. Olson. ". . . But this wolf comes as a wolf." But he could also be acerbic and dismissive of his opponents. "No justice in Supreme Court history has consistently written with the sarcasm of Scalia," Erwin Chemerinsky, now dean of the University of California at Irvine law school, wrote in a widely noted law review article. "No doubt, this makes his opinions among the most entertaining to read. . . . But I think that this sends exactly the wrong message to law students and attorneys about what type of discourse is appropriate in a formal legal setting and how it is acceptable to speak to one another." New Yorker writer Margaret Talbot thought that Scalia's writing made him a rock star, especially among young conservatives. Of all the justices, she wrote, "Scalia is most likely to offer the jurisprudential equivalent of smashing a guitar onstage." Scalia's blunt critiques may have cost him in finding common ground with some of his colleagues. Students of the court believe that his sharp-tongued put-downs of O'Connor - he once said her reasoning in a case could "not be taken seriously" - affected their relationship. Ron Edmonds / AP President Ronald Reagan speaks at a news briefing at the White House in Washington on June 17, 1986, where he announced the nomination of Antonin Scalia, left, to the Supreme Court as a result of Chief Justice Warren E. Burger's resignation. William Rehnquist is at right. President Ronald Reagan speaks at a news briefing at the White House in Washington on June 17, 1986, where he announced the nomination of Antonin Scalia, left, to the Supreme Court as a result of Chief Justice Warren E. Burger's resignation. William Rehnquist is at right. (Ron Edmonds / AP) (Ron Edmonds / AP) He could also be a provocateur outside the courtroom. A reporter once asked him as he was leaving church if he caught flak for his Roman Catholic beliefs, and Scalia responded by flicking his fingers under his chin, a Sicilian insult. Unlike his colleagues, Scalia eagerly discussed constitutional issues and his personal opinions in public. On several occasions, his out-of-court activities prompted critics to question his impartiality. He once went duck hunting with Vice President Richard Cheney, who at the time was the subject of a lawsuit by the Sierra Club seeking the names of people who participated in the vice president's energy task force. Scalia refused to recuse himself from the case, which the Supreme Court had agreed to hear. 
 
 In 2006, he spoke against giving alleged terrorists jury trials - right before the court was set to hear a case on detainee rights, prompting a group of retired generals and admirals to file a friend-of-the-court brief asking him to recuse himself from hearing the appeal filed by Osama bin Laden's alleged driver, Salim Ahmed Hamdan. He participated in that case but had to sit out one that challenged the use of the words "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance. In remarks to a Knights of Columbus rally before the case arrived at the Supreme Court, he suggested that an appeals court had erred in agreeing with the challenger. That said, Scalia often played the role of charming rogue. In less-partisan times, he was a fixture at Georgetown parties; he loved opera and led carol-singing at the court's annual Christmas parties. Every year when Boston University law professor Jay Wexler compiled the number of times the notation "laughter" appeared in transcripts of the court's oral arguments, Scalia was the leading instigator. Nothing illustrated the dynamic so well as his close friendship with Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, with whom he was in frequent disagreement. The two served together on the D.C. Circuit and respected each other's intellect. Scalia and his wife, and Ginsburg and her husband, Martin, celebrated most New Year's Eves together. Ginsburg said no one made her laugh as much as Scalia did. "I love him. But sometimes I'd like to strangle him," she once said. Scalia once wrote in a law review article that legal views are "inevitably affected by moral and theological perceptions." After donning his black robe, he would insist that his religious faith and personal views did not determine the outcome of cases because his textualist, originalist approach insulated him from bias. He believed that judges should defer to elected officials on matters of social policy. But Scalia's faith was integral to his identity. He objected to Vatican II and drove out of his way to find churches that celebrated Mass in Latin. Justice Antonin Scalia, the longest-serving member of the current Supreme Court and an intellectual leader of the conservative legal movement, died Saturday, and his death set off an immediate political battle about the future of the court and its national role. Scalia, 79, was found dead at a... He was the court's most outspoken member on the subject of religion. He urged fellow intellectuals to proudly be "fools for Christ" and used an interview in 2013 to underscore his belief in the existence of the Devil, whose latest maneuver, he said, was "getting people not to believe in him or in God." Scalia wanted to lower the wall of separation between church and state, endorsing school prayer, nativity displays on public property and public money for religious schools. But he insisted that there was no such thing as a "Catholic ," and said his views were shaped by an understanding of the Constitution and a belief that a judge's role is limited. "Don't paint me as anti-gay or antiabortion or anything else," Scalia said at an appearance in 2015. "All I'm doing on the Supreme Court is opining about who should decide: Is it a matter left to the people, or is it a matter of my responsibility as a of the Supreme Court?" Scalia narrowly read individual rights and disdained policies designed to remedy discrimination against women and minorities. He was the lone dissent in a case challenging the state-run Virginia Military Institute's right to exclude female applicants. Scalia believed that discrimination should be judged on an individual basis rather than by treating minorities as an aggrieved group; in his view, policies meant to address discrimination against a group in effect discriminated against individuals. "I owe no man anything, nor he me, because of the blood that flows through our veins," he wrote in a 1979 essay. He was part of majorities that made it harder for workers to bring discrimination claims. He and O'Connor clashed when the court said the University of Michigan Law School could consider race as part of a comprehensive review of an applicant because of the benefits a racially diverse class would bring. In dissent, he wrote: "This is not, of course, an 'educational benefit' on which students will be graded on their Law School transcripts (Works and Plays Well with Others: B+) or tested by the bar examiners (Q: Describe in 500 words or less your cross-racial understanding.)" For much of the public, the perception of Scalia was formed in the polarized court's ruling in Bush v. Gore. Scalia wrote for himself when the court issued an emergency stay to stop the vote-counting in Florida in the 2000 presidential election. "The counting of votes that are of questionable legality does in my view threaten irreparable harm to (Bush), and to the country, by casting a cloud upon what he claims to be the legitimacy of his election," the wrote. To Gore supporters, that sounded like an attempt not to find out which candidate got the most votes but to protect the integrity of Bush's win. Moreover, the five-member majority based its ultimate ruling on an expansive reading of the equal protection clause, which in previous cases involving gays, blacks and women Scalia had preferred to read narrowly. The case was also a departure from his reluctance to endorse federal intrusion in state and local affairs. On gay rights, Scalia fought a losing battle. He warned in his 2003 dissent in Lawrence v. Texas, which struck down a state sodomy law, that the court was paving the way for same-sex marriage. He was not any happier to see his prediction come true. When the court ruled 5 to 4 in 2015 that the Constitution forbade state laws that prohibited same-sex marriage, Scalia said the court had taken its most drastic step in overruling decisions made by the public. "A system of government that makes the People subordinate to a committee of nine unelected lawyers does not deserve to be called a democracy," he wrote in dissent. His great triumph on the court came in writing the majority decision in District of Columbia v. Heller, the Second Amendment case. Most lower courts had long interpreted a 1939 Supreme Court case, United States v. Miller, to mean that the Second Amendment guaranteed the right to bear arms only to members of state militias like the National Guard. Scalia's opinion made it unmistakable that the Constitution requires more than that. The Second Amendment, he said, "surely elevates above all other interests the right of law-abiding, responsible citizens to use arms in defense of hearth and home." More than just a victory for gun rights, the case was significant for being fought on the originalist grounds that Scalia had long championed. He wrote 64 pages on why the authors of the Second Amendment meant to imply an individual right; Justice John Paul Stevens countered with 46 pages of history arguing only for the militia right.
– Antonin Scalia may have disagreed with John Roberts in the court's health care ruling, but he says that disagreement never became personal—and that "it offends me" to hear criticism of Roberts, or any of his colleagues over how they ruled. "No, I haven't had a falling out with Justice Roberts," Scalia told Piers Morgan on CNN last night, according to Politico. "Best buddies?" Morgan asked. Scalia replied, "My best buddy on the court is Ruth Bader Ginsburg—has always been." "There are clashes on legal questions, but not personally," Scalia explained. "The press likes to paint us as nine scorpions in a bottle. That's just not the case." He also dismissed the notion that Roberts' decision was based on political expediency. "We are not a political institution." Scalia wouldn't talk about the court's most recent rulings, but did briefly defend the Citizens United ruling ("You can't separate speech from the money that facilitates the speech.") and Bush v. Gore ("Get over it.").