The verdict is in : Chief Justice Roberts has a sense of humor

I wrote the other day about the kerfuffle over Chief Justice Roberts’s stumbling during his recitation of the oath of office during last week’s presidential inauguration. The matter is still pinballing around the legal media, and will undoubtedly spawn four score and seven law review articles.

The day after the ceremony, just before President Obama and Chief Justice Roberts re-did the oath just to be on the safe side, Vice-President Biden made a crack about his memory not being as good as Roberts’s. For the record, it didn’t bother me that Biden made a joke about the incident ; it bothered me that the joke wasn’t funny. But enough people were apparently miffed enough about it that Biden called up the Chief Justice and apologized.

But it appears that one person who thought it was all worth kidding about was Chief Justice Roberts himself, according to this news item a lawyer friend sent me. The story is about the installation of a new Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution. The Chief Justice holds the largely ceremonial position of Chancellor of the Smithsonian. (Amusingly, the only other ex officio member of the Institution’s Board is the Vice-President.)

The Chief performed the official installation of the new Secretary, presenting him with a badge of office and a special key. (Why do I have the feeling that this key will figure in National Treasure 3 ?) The process didn’t include an oath, which caused Chief Justice Roberts to remark, "I don’t know who was responsible for that decision, but I like ’em."

This press packet from the Smithsonian about the ceremony includes more information and several nice pictures, including the one with this post.

So now that Biden has apologized for his lame joke, and Roberts has made a good joke, I hope we can forget about any supposed hard feelings. In fact, I think it would be great if the Obamas invited the Robertses over to the White House this weekend to watch the Super Bowl. They would both be cheering for the Steelers, I think, they could share Harvard Law stories, and the Roberts children are about the same age as the Obama girls. It would be good for America !