“To some extent, it’s unsettling,” says Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. “You quickly get to view the court as . . . composed of these members, and it becomes kind of hard to think of it as involving anyone else. I suspect it’s like people look at their families.”

“It’s stressful for us because we so admire our colleagues,” adds Justice Anthony M. Kennedy. “We wonder, oh, will it ever be the same?”

“It changes the whole family,” agrees Justice Clarence Thomas. “It’s different. … I have to admit you grow very fond of the court that you spend a long time on. … You get comfortable with that, and then it changes. And now it’s changing again. So the institution, the Nine, is different, the reaction is different. You get to learn each other and you have to start all over, the chemistry is different.”

Although Justice Sotomayor has already participated in some decisions, including a dissent from the court’s refusal to consider a death penalty case involving a potentially innocent man, on Tuesday the new court will hear its first oral arguments, beginning with the much-anticipated campaign finance case Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission.

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Turns out Justice O’Connor wrote an opinion in 1998, joined by her conservative colleagues William Rehnquist, Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas, that cited as persuasive an aspect of foreign law, notwithstanding Republicans’ strong objections to the idea that foreign law can ever be relevant to interpreting the U.S. Constitution.

Here’s the passage, from Eastern Enterprises v. Apfel, 524 U.S. 498 (1998):

“Retroactivity is generally disfavored in the law, in accordance with “fundamental notions of justice” that have been recognized throughout history.” . . . . A similar principle abounds in the laws of other nations. See, e.g., Gustavson Drilling (1964) Ltd. v. Minister of National Revenue, 66 D.L.R. 3d 449, 462 (Can. 1975) (discussing rule that statutes should not be construed in a manner that would impair existing property rights); The French Civil Code, Preliminary Title, art. 2, p. 2 (“Legislation only provides for the future; it has no retroactive effect”) (J. Crabb trans., rev. ed. 1995); Aarnio, Statutory Interpretation in Finland 151, in Interpreting Statutes: A Comparative Study (D. MacCormick & R. Summers eds. 1991) (discussing prohibition against retroactive legislation). “Retroactive legislation,” we have explained, “presents problems of unfairness that are more serious than those posed by prospective legislation, be-cause it can deprive citizens of legitimate expectations and upset settled transactions.” General Motors Corp. v. Romein, 503 U.S. 181, 191, 117 L. Ed. 2d 328, 112 S. Ct. 1105 (1992).

Somehow I don’t think the senators grilling Sotomayor yesterday on her previous statements that foreign law may sometimes be worth considering have read that case.

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