[BuffaloJack]

Too bad they have a commie Pope.

[Regulator]

Maybe we could ask Jan Hus for his opinion about "Catholic Legal Tradition" and "Canon Law"

The American legal system was founded on principles totally opposed to the crimes committed by the Inquisitors

I believe they were engaged in administering "Canon Law" when doing such things

[Buckeye McFrog]

the idea of a professional legal class, that is of lawyers, finds its root in the professionalization of law and the development of the Church's canon law

The Church invented lawyers? Are they sure they REALLY want to take the credit for that one?

[RKV]

Not much. Law existed long before the Catholic Church (e.g. Roman Law).

WRT fundamental principles - separation of church and state is a fundamental American legal concept, and the Catholic Church is against that - rather the Catholic Church is to have special privileges and special influence on the government according to Pius IX in the 1864 Syllabus of Errors. Here are two examples of errors from the encyclical ...
“The Church ought to be separated from the State, and the State from the Church.” (No. 55, separation of church and state)
“In the present day it is no longer expedient that the Catholic religion should be held as the only religion of the State, to the exclusion of all other forms of worship.”

Again, those two propositions are ERRORS according to Pius IX. NO thanks, not for me. Nothing to be gained here except division and strife.

[irishjuggler]

IMO, the presence of so many Catholics on the SCOTUS has less to do with any sort of Catholic legal tradition or philosophy and more to do with the fact that over the past 60 years or so, Catholic education K-12 has done a better job than the teachers’ union-controlled public school system in developing students with the liberal-arts background and critical-reasoning skills useful in catapulting to the top of the legal profession. I believe that 6 of the 9 are products of Catholic education K-12: the GOP appointees (minus Alito) plus Sotomayor.

[DesertRhino]

Actually the 7th. Gorsuch was raised Catholic all his life, went to a Catholic university, and started going to his wife’s Episcopal church because he couldn’t marry her in the RCC.

So essentially, it’s 7 Catholics and two Jewish.

No protestants, no Baptists, no evangelicals need apply.