The blawgosphere is alight with posts on nearly every possible angle and topic related to Justice Scalia's passing. (See
How Appealing for zillions of links.) From a California perspective, speculation about possible nominations of Supreme Court Justices Goodwin Liu or Tino Cuellar, or AG Kamala Harris are available (see
At the Lectern for some links). From a specifically Southern California perspective, the
LA Times and others mention the 9th Circuit's Paul Watford as a possible nominee (
here and
here [also mentioning Judge Nguyen]). [See
Short List for Scalia's Seat Includes California Judges.]
In recent years, Justice Scalia visited Pepperdine Law School,
USC,
USD, and appeared in
California Lawyer (
video) and at the State Bar's Annual Meeting in San Diego in
2014. He also attended bar events in LA (particularly along with his co-author Bryan Garner, e.g.,
here for ABTL). Considering how infrequently SCOTUS Justices visit SoCal, Justice Scalia was arguably something of a regular.
Now, on to what everyone is going to be asking you, the neighborhood appellate specialist: What happens if there's a 4-to-4 tie at the Supreme Court among the eight serving justices? The answer, of course, is that a tie effectively means an
affirmance: The lower court decision remains intact, and no new precedent is created by the Supreme Court.
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