Conservative U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia had some advice Wednesday for those who questioned his impartiality after he refused to recuse himself from a case involving his hunting buddy, Vice President Dick Cheney.
"For Pete's sake, if you can't trust your Supreme Court justice more than that, get a life," Scalia said.
Scalia, addressing an audience at the University of Connecticut's law school on Wednesday, said recusing himself from the 2004 case -- which focused on an energy task force that Cheney led -- would only have given fuel to newspaper editorial writers and other detractors who have said he is too close to the vice president.
"I think the proudest thing I have done on the bench is not allowed myself to be chased off that case," Scalia said.
The case in question involved Cheney's request to keep private the details of closed-door White House strategy sessions that produced the administration's energy policy.
The administration fought a lawsuit brought by watchdog and environmental groups that contended that industry executives, including former Enron chairman Ken Lay, helped shape that policy. The Supreme Court upheld the administration position on a 7-2 vote.
Scalia refused to recuse himself from the case, rejecting arguments by critics who questioned his impartiality because of a hunting vacation that he took with Cheney while the case was pending.
Scalia told the audience Wednesday that he would have stepped aside had the case involved Cheney personally, but that he viewed it differently because the vice president was named in his official capacity as head of the group.
Scalia, 70, was appointed in 1982 by President Ronald Reagan to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. Reagan nominated him four years later to the U.S. Supreme Court, filling the opening that occurred when William Rehnquist became chief justice.
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