A Renewed Call to Televise High Court

The court has made some concessions to modernity: Starting with Gore v. Bush in 2000, it has released same-day audiotapes in 16 high-profile oral arguments, and beginning this term, it has quickly posted transcripts of the arguments on the court's Web site.

But several of the justices seem unwilling to go further. Justice David H. Souter, perhaps the most publicity-averse of the nine, is famous for his statement that cameras will enter the chamber "over my dead body."

Justice Clarence Thomas is opposed, and while Scalia and Ginsburg have said they could support gavel-to-gavel coverage of oral arguments, Scalia acknowledges that is unrealistic. A frequent critic of Supreme Court journalism that he says reduces the court's complex decisions to whether "the good guys lost and the bad guys won," he said in 2005 that showing clips of the proceedings would "misinform rather than inform" the public.

The two newest justices, Roberts and Samuel A. Alito Jr., sounded open to the possibility during their confirmation hearings, and Alito favored allowing cameras in his previous job as an appellate court judge. But neither seems inclined to push the issue with justices who are opposed.

The issue of who decides seems as important to some justices as the decision itself.

"We feel strongly that we have intimate knowledge of the dynamics and the needs of the court," Kennedy told Congress last year, "and we think that proposals mandating and directing television in our court are inconsistent with the deference and etiquette that should apply between the branches."

That just sets Specter off.

He runs off a long list of cases in which the court found fault with federal legislation, and he seems particularly peeved about a 5 to 4 decision striking down a domestic violence act, in which former Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist questioned Congress's "method of reasoning."

"When I read United States v. Morrison. . . I wondered what kind of a transformation there was when you leave the Senate chamber, where our columns are aligned exactly with the Supreme Court columns across the green, what kind of a transformation there was with method of reasoning that there is such superior status when going to the court," Specter said.

Such comments -- Specter also questioned the dwindling number of cases the court accepts and its process for reviewing petitions -- open the senator to criticism that his proposal for cameras seems born of pique more than concern.

"No, I respect their authority to make the final decision," Specter said. "But I think it ought to be known to the public."

Staff researcher Madonna Lebling contributed to this report.