Who's Asking?

Nate Silver, statistician to the stars, takes on the Supreme Court, but I wonder if he is an authority in the etiquette of the Supremes:

In oral arguments before the Supreme Court last week, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. introduced a statistical claim that he took to imply that an important provision of the Voting Rights Act has become outmoded.

Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act, which is being challenged by Shelby County, Ala., in the case before the court, requires that certain states, counties and townships with a history of racial discrimination get approval (or “pre-clearance”) from the Department of Justice before making changes to their voting laws. But Chief Justice Roberts said that Mississippi, which is covered by Section 5, has the best ratio of African-American to white turnout, while Massachusetts, which is not covered, has the worst, he said.

Chief Justice Roberts’s statistics appear to come from data compiled in 2004 by the Census Bureau, which polls Americans about their voting behavior as part of its Current Population Survey.

Well, Chief Justice Roberts numbers come from the dissent to the case on appeal (p. 77 and following). On to the punchline:

As much as it pleases me to see statistical data introduced in the Supreme Court, the act of citing statistical factoids is not the same thing as drawing sound inferences from them. If I were the lawyer defending the Voting Rights Act, I would have responded with two queries to Chief Justice Roberts.

Ahh, I don't think many lawyers take it upon themselves to start questioning the Supremes. My understanding of the division of labor is that the Justices ask the questions and the attorneys answer.

And here in America (unlike, for example, France) we have an adversarial judicial system. The attorneys for both sides are expected to be familiar with the arguments and potential rebuttals. Roberts misapplied some statistics? Roberts raised a point made in the dissent and the attorney had no ready response. That is hardly Roberts' fault if the attorney is poorly prepared.

Mr. Silver closes with an interesting point that, unfortunately, totally ignores the context of the Roberts exchange:

Most of you will spot the logical fallacy in the following claim: 

No aircraft departing from a United States airport has been hijacked since the Sept. 11 attacks, when stricter security standards were implemented. Therefore, the stricter security is unnecessary.

As much as I might want to be sympathetic to this claim (I fly a lot and am wary of the “security theater” at American airports), it ought not to be very convincing as a logical proposition.

Similarly, he goes on to explain, the currently favorable turnout figures for Mississippi might simply reflect the efficacy of the Voting Right Act procedures.

Well, sure. But Justice Scalia had hammered that very point immediately before Roberts chimed in with his question about relative turnout (transcript, p. 30 and following):

GENERAL VERRILLI: But I think -- but, Mr. Chief Justice, that is why I made the point a minute ago that the key way in which Section 5 -- it has to be the case, everyone agrees, that the significant progress that we've made is principally because of Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act. And it has always been true that only a tiny fraction of submissions result in objections.

JUSTICE SCALIA: That will always be true forever into the future. You could always say, oh, there has been improvement, but the only reason there has been improvement are these extraordinary procedures that deny the States sovereign powers, which the Constitution preserves to them. So, since the only reason it's improved is because of these procedures, we must continue those procedures in perpetuity.

And after a half a page of brief back and forth, Roberts is the next Justice to speak:

CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: Just to get the - do you know which State has the worst ratio of white voter turnout to African American voter turnout?

GENERAL VERRILLI: I do not.

CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: Massachusetts. Do you know what has the best, where African American turnout actually exceeds white turnout? Mississippi.

GENERAL VERRILLI: Yes, Mr. Chief Justice. But Congress recognized that expressly in the findings when it reauthorized the act in 2006. It said that the first generation problems had been largely dealt with, but there persisted significant -

CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: Which State has the greatest disparity in registration between white and African American?

GENERAL VERRILLI: I do not know that.

CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: Massachusetts. Third is Mississippi, where again the African American registration rate is higher than the white registration

GENERAL VERRILLI: But when Congress -- the choice Congress faced when it -- Congress wasn't writing on a blank slate in 2006, Mr. Chief Justice. It faced a choice. And the choice was whether the conditions were such that it could confidently conclude that this deterrence and this constraint was no longer needed, and in view of the record of continuing need and in view of that history, which we acknowledge is not sufficient on its own to justify reenactment, but it's certainly relevant to the judgment Congress made because it justifies Congress having made a cautious choice in 2006 to keep the constraint and to keep the deterrence in place.

This 'Congress must have had something in mind when they passed it' argument would probably not convince libs if the topic were the Defense of Marriage Act.

EX POST VINDICATION: Orin Kerr at the Volokh Conspiracy quotes this exchange during the gay marriage arguments:

JUSTICE SCALIA: I’m curious, when -­ when did — when did it become unconstitutional to exclude homosexual couples from marriage? 1791? 1868, when the Fourteenth Amendment was adopted? Sometimes — some time after Baker, where we said it didn’t even raise a substantial Federal question? When — when — when did the law become this?

MR. OLSON: When — may I answer this in the form of a rhetorical question? When did it become unconstitutional to prohibit interracial marriages? When did it become unconstitutional to assign children to separate schools.

JUSTICE SCALIA: It’s an easy question, I think, for that one. At — at the time that the Equal Protection Clause was adopted. That’s absolutely true. But don’t give me a question to my question. When do you think it became unconstitutional? Has it always been unconstitutional? . . .

 

Comments

[daddy]

Watching Megan Kelly talking to Rand on FOX this minute. He's doing a fine job, and apparently he just received the answer he wanted from Eric Holder.

He also did a decent job responding to the comments on the Senate Floor of McCain and Lindsey Graham. Here it is word for word from my typing from the tape:

The McCain clip: We've done a, I think, a disservice to a lot of Americans by making them believe that somehow they're in danger from their Government. They're not. But we are in danger, we are in danger from a dedicated, longstanding, easily replaceable leadership enemy that is hell bent on our destruction.

The Graham clip: If he wants this President to tell him that he will not use a drone to kill an American citizen sitting in a cafe having a cup of coffee, who is not a combatant, I find the question offensive.

Megyn Kelly: 2 points there. Number 1, they suggest you are focused on the wrong danger, and number 2 they think you're demeaning the office of the Presidency. Your thoughts.

Rand Paul.

The reason the question is asked is precisely because of the theories behind Senator McCain and Graham's logic.They think the whole world is a battlefield including America and that the "Laws of War" should apply. The Laws of War don't involve Due Process, so Senator Graham has been very explicit on the Floor to say "When they ask you for an Attorney you tell them to Shut Up.'That's not sort of my understanding of the way America works. It's not the way I understand when an American would be accused of a crime, that they would tell him if you want a Lawyer to Shut Up, so I don't think the Laws of War apply to America, I think the Bill Of Rights do, and I think its a disservice to our soldiers that we have Senators up there arguing that the Bill of Rights aren't important. This is a very serious question. It was a question that took me a month and a half to get an answer to, and so I would argue, and I think that a lot of the Public would agree with me, both on the Right and the Left, that what we asked was a very serious question, and it's a question that I think we finally got an answer to, so the president apparently thought it was a serious enough question to answer.

[Neo]

I knew that the Voting Rights Act was potentially in trouble when the feds indicted elections officials in Mississippi for conspiracy to deny civil rights ... to white voters. It seems that all the indicted were African American.

[Neo]

As for those comments on the Senate Floor of McCain and Lindsey Graham ...

The filibuster also worked because Paul had credibility. Were it led by an older Republican Senator who had been around during the Bush administration, it would have smacked of political opportunism. Though this will boost Paul’s national political profile, nobody would deny that he’s been consistent. Also, for all the post-election discussions about the demise of the Republican Party, the filibuster also showed how it could have a bright future. Watching stars like Mike Lee, Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio help out Paul showed that the GOP’s got talent.

[Jane: Mock the Media]

I find lately that there is so much mush. I either respect and admire a politician, primarily because he is not afraid to stand up for the constitution, or think he should be mocked and ignored - and the latter is not just reserved for democrats.

The left is all about mush, as you see in GENERAL VERRILLI's statement. But a whole lot on the right are nothing but mush as well.

A pox on all their houses.

[Janet]

Amen, Jane.

[AliceH]

--On to the punchlie--

New coinage? Or Best. Typo. Ever. ?

You decide. :)

[daddy]

Goes without saying, but Shephard Smith of FOX is very critical of Rand Paul for wasting the Senate's important time yesterday.

I recall when Roger Ailes dumped Paula Zahn and said "I could have put a dead raccoon on the air this year and got a better rating.

I think he could put an elephant turd on in Shep's place and improve that time-slot's numbers 100%.

[Jane - Mock the Media!]

Thank goodness this did not get lost in the sequester:

State Dept. Offers Special Two-Year Passports for Transgenders in Transition

Gimme a break!

[Ignatz Ratzkywatzky]

It might be worth noting Silver has a BA in economics, not statistics, with a minor in self promotion.

[NK]

Congrats Jon Roberts for zinging the Sol Gen. I wonder why thet POS at the WaPo didn't mention this part of the transcript when he took sides with the 2 LesbianLibs bickering with Scalia.

[Chubby]

I wonder if the timing of Obama's dinner was deliberately planned to draw attention away from the filibuster, or if the timing was just a coincidence.

[daddy]

Chubby,

Rand Paul on FOX said that he did consider having a filibuster until he walked into the Senate and found the Floor was open. He said he had not planned to do it beforehand. If so, I would think the Obama dinner was planned first, and I could see the petulant McCain and Graham getting pissy about it, thinking that Rand Paul was doing this as some sort of off the cuff publicity stunt to distract from their all so important dinner with the Prez.

[Cecil Turner]

Most of you will spot the logical fallacy in the following claim:

Oh hell, that one was easy. How 'bout this one:

Members of the opposing party traditionally sit during the SOTU . . . but this time it proves the GOP is racist.

Tricky, eh?

[Gus]

Is Lindsey Graham going thru menopause??

[Ignatz Ratzkywatzky]

I don't think so. Don't you have to be pre menopausal to have PMS?

[DGS]

As a Mass resident I do notice that many of the liberals I meet in Mass are really racist I actually have heard some say things like, "We need to help them with this because they can't help themselves." When I've asked why the person believes they can't help themselves I get comments like, "They don't know how." I've said things like then teach them and gotten responses like, "They can't learn".

[narciso]

Silver needless to say, is Journolist, and the TSA did nothing to stop Richard Reid, AbdulMutallab, the Newburgh plot, the JFK one, right off the top of my head.

[narciso]

That is an interesting bit, about Massachussetts,

[daddy]

Oops, my top line to Chubby was wrong. I left out the word "Not"

Rand Paul on FOX said that he did Not consider having a filibuster until he walked into the Senate and found the Floor was open.

Sorry for my bad typo error. Completely blew what I was trying to convey that he said.

[bgates]

If Massachusetts has not just the highest but the worst ratio of white voter turnout to African American voter turnout, and especially if the state regarded as best is not Illinois or Alabama (the states with turnout rate ratio closest to one) but Mississippi, "where African American turnout actually exceeds white turnout", can we extrapolate to predict the ideal turnout ratio would be a state where no white people voted at all?

[boatbuilder]

"Since the imposition of martial law and the complete suspension of the Bill of Rights, the crime rate has decreased substantially. Therefore the Bill of Rights will be suspended indefinitely."
Back to you, Nate.

[Jack is Back]

In grad school, I had to take an advanced econometrics course in which John Tukey was quoted:

""An approximate answer to the right problem is worth a good deal more than an exact answer to an approximate problem."

Silver needs to read more.

[AliceH]

Drat. No comet that I could see. Still, it's supposed to be "most" visible March 12-15 or something, I think. Will keep hoping.

[Veeshir]

When I lived in Boston I saw a documentary on Boston on PBS.
It was about blacks moving into Boston in the 50s.
The city leader they were talking to said something to the effect that they didn't want blacks mixing in so "we made sure they moved to Roxbury with the Jews."

Anybody who knows the demographics of Boston can see exactly how true that is.

But it's them southern states that are all racist and stuff.

[Ignatz Ratzkywatzky]

Some of the most bigoted people I knew were my otherwise good hearted uncles.
Dyed in the wool Democrats, each and every one til the day they croaked.

[Ignatz Ratzkywatzky]

--When I've asked why the person believes they can't help themselves I get comments like, "They don't know how." I've said things like then teach them and gotten responses like, "They can't learn".--

I think I often truly underestimate just how much this soft bigotry, which is racism pure and simple, undergirds AA and the left's thinking on race.

I find myself thinking I'm engaging in hyperbole sometimes when I point out the ramifications of what the left says, because it's too easy to take them at their word that it really is fairness and redressing grievances or is just race baiting on their part, but the more closely you listen the clearer it is many of them really think black people can't even manage to get a photo ID.

[Mitch]

It is Silver who is guilty of a logical fallacy, the ignoratio elenchi or red herring. That "the Voting Rights Act has been effective" is not in dispute. What is in dispute is whether Section 5, which departs from the normal constitutional balance of federal and state powers, continues to be an "appropriate" means of protecting minority voting rights under the 15th Amendment.

To our mind, medicine provides a better analogy than airport security. Proponents of Section 5's constitutionality are arguing something like this: The patient's symptoms have improved markedly since we began administering antibiotics, and he now shows no sign of infection. Therefore, the antibiotics are working, and he should continue taking them for the rest of his life.

- James Taranto