SENTENCE FIRST, TRIAL AFTERWARDS: Linda Greenhouse on the recently-deceased Judge Stephen Reinhardt: “Doctrinal purity mattered less to him than extracting even the most gossamer claim to a favorable result.” Greenhouse comes not to bury Reinhardt, but to praise him, but I don’t find the notion that judges should reason backward from the result they want generally praiseworthy. I don’t think Greenhouse would, either, if it had been a conservative doing so.