Scalia’s discussion of whether his plane ride was a gift, what it was worth and whether it needed to be disclosed helps illuminate the legal standards that apply to Justice Clarence Thomas’ travels. What Scalia's defense of free jet trip means for Thomas:
Dick CheneyChief Justice of the United States since 2005
The trip ripened into a controversy, as the court had recently agreed to hear a case in which Cheney was a party. Lawyers for the other side asked Scalia to disqualify himself, and he issued a combative 21-page memorandum refusing to do so.
But he disputed an assertion in the motion seeking his disqualification that he, and members of his family who accompanied him, had received a gift worth “thousands of dollars.” Scalia discussed whether his flight with Cheney had to be disclosed, concluding that “social courtesies, provided at government expense,” need not be.
In his 2011 year-end report on the state of the federal judiciary, Chief Justice John Roberts said that the constitutionality of the law was untested but that he and his colleagues obeyed it. He added that the Judicial Conference of the United States, the policymaking body for the federal courts, had recently issued new guidelines requiring disclosure of travel by private jet and stays in commercial properties such as resorts.In his 2004 memorandum, Scalia said he could sit on the case involving Cheney because the vice president had been sued in his official capacity, adding that there was a cost to questioning the ethics of Supreme Court justices.
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