510 U.S. 540 (1994)
In 1991 petitioners were charged in federal district court with willful destruction of property of the United States at the Fort Benning Military Reservation in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1361.1 The indictment alleged acts of vandalism that included the spilling of human blood on walls and other objects at the reservation.2
Petitioners moved before trial to disqualify the district judge under 28 U.S.C. § 455(a).3 The motion rested on events that had occurred during and immediately after a 1983 bench trial of petitioner Bourgeois before the same judge.4 Bourgeois, a Catholic priest of the Maryknoll order, had been tried and convicted in that earlier proceeding of misdemeanors committed during a protest action on the federal enclave of Fort Benning.5
The disqualification motion cited specific words and acts by the judge during the 1983 trial.6 These included statements that the purpose of the trial was to try a criminal case and not to provide a political forum, limitations placed on defense counsel's cross-examination, periodic cautions to confine questions and answers to material issues, an admonition during closing argument against making a speech in a political forum, and the sentence imposed on Bourgeois. The motion also pointed to the judge's interruption of a codefendant's closing argument to bar the introduction of new facts.7
At the outset of the 1991 trial Bourgeois' counsel stated an intent to focus the defense on the political motivation for the charged acts, namely protest against United States involvement in El Salvador.8 The judge indicated he would allow petitioners to state their political purposes in opening argument and testimony but would not permit long speeches or discussions of Government policy.9 When counsel began to explain circumstances in El Salvador the prosecutor objected and the judge barred discussion of those events.10 The judge denied the recusal motion both before and during trial.11 Petitioners were convicted.12
The Eleventh Circuit affirmed the convictions.13 The Supreme Court granted certiorari.14
Whether required recusal under 28 U.S.C. § 455(a) is subject to the extrajudicial source doctrine?15
The extrajudicial source doctrine applies to § 455(a) because the pejorative connotation of partiality requires that a disqualifying predisposition be wrongful or inappropriate, either because it is undeserved, rests on knowledge the judge ought not possess, or is excessive in degree; the reasonableness limitation in the statute reinforces this requirement, and the doctrine is not eliminated by the absence of the word personal from subsection (a).16
Yes. The Court held that the extrajudicial source doctrine applies to recusal under 28 U.S.C. § 455(a).17 The term partiality carries the same pejorative connotation as bias or prejudice.18 The reasonableness limitation would produce the same result.19
Applying the rule to the facts, none of the grounds asserted by petitioners required disqualification.20 The cited events from the 1983 trial and the 1991 proceedings consisted of judicial rulings, routine trial administration efforts, and ordinary admonishments to counsel and witnesses.21 All occurred in the course of judicial proceedings.22 Neither relied upon knowledge acquired outside such proceedings nor displayed deep-seated and unequivocal antagonism that would render fair judgment impossible.23
The judge's statements limiting discussion of political motivations and events in El Salvador, his cautions during cross-examination and closing argument, and his interruption of a codefendant were ordinary efforts at courtroom administration that remain immune from recusal challenges.
The extrajudicial source doctrine applies to § 455(a) and the district judge was not required to recuse himself on the facts presented.24
Related opinions on this issue
Joined by Blackmun, Stevens, And Souter, Jj.
Justice Kennedy concurred in the judgment only.25 He agreed that there is no per se extrajudicial source rule under § 455(a).26 He argued that the majority placed undue emphasis upon the source of the challenged mindset.27
The central inquiry under § 455(a) is the appearance of partiality, not its place of origin.28 Disqualification is required if an objective observer would entertain reasonable questions about the judge's impartiality.29 Kennedy rejected the majority's impossibility of fair judgment test as too lenient.30
That test is difficult to distinguish from a per se rule and inconsistent with the objective standard Congress adopted.31 He would apply the statute as written to all charges of partiality without importing limitations from subsection (b).32