Kennedy memoir sheds light on former center of Supreme Court gay rights, abortion rulings

Source: USA Today

Sept. 23. 2025, 5:07 a.m. ET


WASHINGTON − When then-Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote the opinions in a series of major gay rights cases, he was surprised – and disappointed − by the vehemence of the opposition from some of his colleagues. That was particularly true for the 2015 blockbuster decision legalizing same-sex marriage nationwide, Kennedy recounts in a forthcoming memoir.

Justice Antonin Scalia lashed out against the right to same-sex marriage and also took a personal swipe at Kennedy. Scalia’s attack “weakened his opinion, enabling me to shrug it off,” Kennedy wrote in “Life, Law and Liberty,” being published Oct. 14 by Simon & Schuster.

But Kennedy’s family was “devastated by the tone of the dissent.” Kennedy, though, had plenty of experience being at the center of polarizing issues.

'The cases swung, not me'

After joining the court in 1988, the Reagan appointee emerged as its ideological center, bridging the gap between liberal and conservative justices by being open to siding with either bloc. By the time he stepped down from the court in 2018, Kennedy had been the swing vote on major issues, including abortion, affirmative action, gay rights and capital punishment, often siding with the court’s more liberal justices. Time magazine called him “the Decider.”

Read more: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2025/09/23/supreme-court-justice-kennedy-memoir-gay-mariage-abortion/86294098007/