Sen. Ted Cruz's new book 'Going Further' praises Justice Clarence Thomas
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What is the premise of Ted Cruz’s book “Going Further” about Justice Clarence Thomas?
Hey, it's NPS Book of the Day. I'm Andrew Limbaugh. I think you learn a lot about someone by how they talk about someone whose work they revere. Artists, writers, and musicians can be kind of iffy and shy talking about their own work, but get them going on someone else's art and you get to see how they think and what they deem important and valuable. The same is true of politicians. Senator Ted Cruz is on the pod today, and his new book isn't one of those political memoir type books. Instead, it is a glowing look at the career of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, titled Going Further. In the book, Cruz paints Thomas as an independent thinker willing to go against the grain. After the break, NPR's Steve Inskeep asks him for proof of that.
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Senator Ted Cruz has written a book praising Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. The Texas lawmaker highlights Thomas' rise from poverty and his move to the political right.
When he was in college and law school, he was a left-wing radical. And Justice Thomas today describes himself as an angry young man, angry at God, angry at the world.
By the 1980s, Thomas was Republican, leaning on the individualism he'd learned growing up. Today, he's the court's senior justice and among its most conservative. The book, going further, calls attention to Thomas and also to its author, who used to argue cases before the court. People will wonder about your choice here. Does this book, for example, tell us what kind of Supreme Court justice you think you would be if you ever had the opportunity?
So it doesn't, Steve, for the simple reason that I don't want to be a judge. You will never be a judge? I will never be a judge. Okay, go on.
How does Cruz describe Clarence Thomas’s early life and shift from a left‑wing radical to a conservative justice?
The reason I don't want to be a judge... is a principled judge stays out of politics and stays out of policy fights. And if I were a judge, I'd do that. I'd stay out of those fights. I don't want to stay out of those fights.
Well, that leads to my next question then. Does this book tell us what kind of Supreme Court justice you would appoint if you ever had the opportunity?
Absolutely, yes. And I think that in our lifetimes, we have had four giants on the court. Clarence Thomas, Antoinette Scalia, Sam Alito, and my former boss, Chief Justice William Rehnquist.
Clarence Thomas has authored opinions on gun rights and joined the ruling overturning a right to abortion. Cruz says he's also comfortable filing dissents, even if the vote is 8-1.
There has never been a Supreme Court justice more willing to go back to the original Constitution, go back to the original understanding of And to overturn precedent. He is the most willing to overturn precedent.
I want to jump in right there because you have this quote from Antonin Scalia, the late Supreme Court justice, who is conservative but concluded, you say, at some point he didn't want to try to overturn everything. And his quote is, I'm an originalist. I'm a textualist. I'm not a nut. And then you say Clarence Thomas is the nut. What do you mean by that?
Well, look, I mean, Scalia was being somewhat biased. self-deprecating and hyperbolic. And another exchange that I described in the same chapter is Scalia said to Thomas when he's pushing to overrule older precedents that he thinks are wrong, Scalia said, Clarence, you're tilting at windmills. And Thomas responds, neato.
Why does Cruz say he would never become a judge, and what does that reveal about his view of the judiciary?
windmills are dangerous. Okay. He was willing to argue against precedents. And look, some of it is, this is a man who was born in 1948. In 1948, Plessy versus Ferguson was still the law of the land. The Supreme Court had ruled that separate but equal would pay.
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Chapters
5 chapters
1
What is the premise of Ted Cruz’s book “Going Further” about Justice Clarence Thomas?
0:02–2:19
2
How does Cruz describe Clarence Thomas’s early life and shift from a left‑wing radical to a conservative justice?
2:19–3:59
3
Why does Cruz say he would never become a judge, and what does that reveal about his view of the judiciary?
3:59–6:01
4
In what ways does Justice Thomas “go further” by overturning precedent, according to Cruz?
6:01–8:22
5
What did Antonin Scalia mean when he called Thomas “the nut,” and how does Cruz respond?
8:22–9:56
Speakers
7 identifiedMore from NPR's Book of the Day
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