Justice Clarence Thomas isn’t known for being particularly chatty on the bench, preferring to listen to arguments at the Court rather than engaging in the noisy sparring that some of the supremes seem to think passes for being judicious. Thomas doesn’t go out of his way to draw attention to himself. And so perhaps it was just an oversight that when it opened a year ago, the Smithsonian’s new National Museum of African American History and Culture seemed to forget all about Thomas.
Last year Adam White lamented in these pages, “it’s a shame to see the new museum marred by its own decision to expunge from its historical narrative one of the most important African-American statesmen of our time.”
But The Scrapbook is in a generous mood and prefers not to think ill of the nice people at the Smithsonian. We would hate to think that Thomas was being shunned because he is a conservative or because he famously overcame a vicious and toxic campaign of calumny mounted by the left.
Whatever the reason for its initial decision, the Smithsonian has finally corrected its oversight by including a label for Thomas along with the one for Thurgood Marshall in its “Supreme Court” exhibit. We now look forward to when the museum undertakes a thorough and fair-minded analysis of the justice’s thoughtful and influential opinions.
