Reforming the Supreme Court Mike Rappaport

Somehow, I missed this NRO column by Nelson Lund and Craig Lerner on how to reform the Supreme Court.  They recommend four reforms:

1. Take away their law clerks.

2. Force them to decide common-law cases.

3. Bring back circuit riding.

4. Eliminate signed opinions.

I agree with the spirit of each of these reforms and support the first three.  (I would cut down the number of clerks rather than eliminating them and I would require the justices to sit on lower court cases during the summer as a form of circuit riding.)  I am skeptical about eliminating signed opinions.  The authors argue that signed opinions promote self indulgent separate opinions, which is true some of the time.  But signed opinions also promote responsibility and allow criticism of the justices.