THE HEARINGS on John Roberts’s and Sam Alito’s nominations to the Supreme Court featured a Latin phrase most people hear only in connection with Supreme Court confirmations: stare decisis. Stare decisis is the legal doctrine holding that in general, an issue once decided should stay decided, and not be revisited. This exchange between Judge Alito and Senator Arlen Specter, near the beginning of Alito’s testimony, was one of many similar colloquies:
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