Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia has again refused repeated calls for his recusal in a case before the Court, which involves his personal friend, Vice President Dick Cheney. The uproar over conflict of interest was prompted by a controversial hunting trip, during which Justice Scalia allegedly received a number of "gifts" from the litigant, Cheney, including transportation in Vice-Presidential aircraft, special security protection, and ground transport.

The hunting trip was a private gathering, and there is no public knowledge of what may have transpired during the expedition. In a new, and unusual, memorandum of explanation, Justice Scalia maintains that he "never hunted with him in the same blind or had other opportunity for private conversation" with the Vice President.

Scalia asserted that the only logical grounds for requests that he recuse himself would be the mere fact of his friendship with the Vice President. He maintained that this is not a legal basis for recusal on the Supreme Court and suggested that it is routine for Supreme Court Justices to be granted their lifelong appointments "precisely because they were friends of the incumbent president or other senior officials".

While many have speculated about who invited whom, and have suggested that the Justice was asked along by the VP, Scalia says it was the other way around: that he invited VP Cheney to accompany him on a hunting trip with Wallace Carline, a friend of Justice Scalia.

The case at issue regards the request for information about Dick Cheney's Energy Task Force to be made public. [For more: Salon]