1) Justice Scalia spends relatively little space in his book detailing how he would implement his philosophy of statutory and
constitutional interpretation. Presumably he (and his colleagues) would keep deciding cases the way Scalia now does. Scalia acknowledges Professor Wood's point that the methods of interpretation in current use are deeply embedded in American history. However, he adds that "acknowledging evil is one thing, and embracing it is something else" (p. 131). Scalia does not consider judicial lawmaking merely as a peripheral problem, but rather "a question utterly central to the existence if democratic government" (p. 133). In effect, he is arguing that eradicating current practice is so important that whatever problems are inherent in implementing his solution, they are worth the cost and are less costly than continuing along the present path.
He offers, however, several suggestions for easing the problems of implementation. He recognizes and would apply stare decisis, the applicability of past court precedents, as necessary for legal stability (pp. 7-9; and p. 140). He also would use traditional canons of statutory interpretation and presumptions when they make sense to him and are not artificial rules (pp. 26 and 28). He goes out of his way to reassure the reader that he is not an extremist --e.g "while the good textualist is not a literalist, neither is he a nihilist" (p. 24). Although he would search for the original meaning given to a clause in 1790, he is willing to construe the First Amendment, for example, to cover types of speech, which were not then in existence (p. 140).
2) This case may not afford the judge an opportunity to make new law re cloning because it is not an issue which needs to be decided to dispose of the manslaughter indictment. What the judge does have to decide is whether a cloned embryo of that age is a person who has been killed, a quite different issue than whether cloning is i...