Justices’ lucrative book deals deserve more scrutiny

It was around the time the justices crossed the $10 million threshold in book earnings that I started to change my mind about the whole enterprise. But let's back up a bit. By statute, the chief justice has an annual salary of $320,700 and the associate justices $306,600. On top of that, ethics rules limit them from making more than about $35,000 annually in outside income, which generally comes from teaching – though there are several exceptions. These primarily include real estate, investments, inheritance, and writing. The real estate exception does have ethical implications; a person could curry favor with...