The Federal Society hosted a reception for recently-appointed judge to the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals, L. Steven Grasz, which was hosted by the Federalist Society’s Nebraska Lawyers Chapter. Grasz is a Nebraska native and was recently appointed to the Eight Circuit Court of Appeals by President Trump. There were a handful of VIPs in the audience, including Lt. Gov. Foley, Hal Daub, Aimee Melton, and plenty of law students and practicing attorneys in the area. The emcee was State Senator Mike Hilgers (whose dad I happen to work for), and he gave a brief introduction to Grasz before he took the stage.
I was fairly impressed with Grasz. He illustrated his judicial philosophy with a passage from Animal Farm, where the pigs famously altered their list of commandments painted on the barn. He seemed to differentiate between being a Constitutionalist, an Originalist, and a Textualist in ways I couldn’t follow, but he clearly laid out his philosophy when asked during the Q&A when popular opinion could override parts of the Constitution. His answer, outside of amending the Constitution, was never.
I think I can see why the ABA declared he was “unqualified.”
