A Long, Slow Journey Toward More Judicial Transparency

Over a decade ago, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. assured the public that members of the U.S. Supreme Court do in fact consult the Code of Judicial Conduct when assessing their ethical obligations.

The high court uses the code much the way the lower courts do: as guidance, he said.

Roberts made the statements in his 2011 Year-End Report on the Federal Judiciary to address questions around whether the Judicial Conference’s Code of Conduct should apply to the high court.

But those questions persist, and The Washington Free Beacon added fuel to the fire Monday when it ran an ...