My Grandfather`s Son, by Clarence Thomas: on Government Reform


1980: Voted for Reagan & against ever-larger government

In the fall of 1980, I changed my voter registration from Missouri to Maryland--and registered as a Republican. I had decided to vote for Ronald Reagan. It was a giant step for a black man, but I believed it to be a logical one. I saw no good coming from an ever-larger government that meddled, with incompetence if not mendacity, in the lives of citizens, and I was particularly distressed by the Democratic Party's ceaseless promises to legislate the problems of blacks out of existence. Their misguided efforts had already done great harm to my people, and I felt sure that anything else they did would compound the damage. Reagan, by contrast, was promising to get government off our backs and out of our lives, putting an end to the indiscriminate social engineering of the sixties and seventies.
Source: My Grandfather's Son: A Memoir by Clarence Thomas, p.130 Oct 1, 2007

Judge's role is to interpret law, not to make policy choices

I was informed that I would be confirmed for the Court of Appeals, but that I could expect things to be very different if I were to be nominated to the Supreme Court. Despite their grilling, and the months of preparation that had led up to it, the actual hearings proved to be uneventful. The questioning proceeded fairly briskly. By the end of the day, it was over and done with.

As I reflected on the long, unpleasant process that had led up to this brief public performance, I was struck by how easy it had become for sanctimonious whites to accuse a black man of not caring about civil rights.

Given my initial ambivalence about becoming a judge, I was surprised to find that I liked the job. Part of what made it so agreeable was that I got along so well with most of my new colleagues.

"What is my role, in this case--as a judge?" The role of a judge is to interpret and apply the choices made in the legislative and executive branches. Not to make policy choices of his own.

Source: My Grandfather's Son: A Memoir by Clarence Thomas, p.201-204 Oct 1, 2007

  • The above quotations are from My Grandfather`s Son: A Memoir, by Clarence Thomas.
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Page last updated: Feb 06, 2014