Re: 5/25-29 Dark Week Time Wasting Thread

Tom W wrote:

Brady wrote:

Anyway, conferring (or denying) Constitutional rights by popular vote is a dangerous notion. Would defenders of the 'right of the people to decide' have defended Jim Crow laws against 'judicial activism?'

That's what I'd like to see an interviewer ask, say, the Family Research Council's Tony Perkins (among others): Was the US Supreme Court's decision in Brown vs. Board of Education an example of 'judicial activism?' What if a particular state had put it to a vote, and the majority of voters of that state decided to affirm segregation in public schools? Would 'the people of the state' -- *should* the people of the state -- have had that right?

I think those are the types of questions that need to be asked of those who decry 'judicial activism' and 'legislating from the bench.'

That issue was the root of the judicial activism charge. The strict constructionist and judicial activist arguments were a way of deflecting segregation from being about race.

I get the impression that the 'conservatives' who have been arguing that Sonia Sotomayor's remark about the 'richness of the experiences of Latina women' is a 'racist statement' -- e.g., Rush Limbaugh, Newt Gingrich, Pat Buchanan, Glenn Beck, Lou Dobbs, Ann Coulter -- would also think "Ebony" and "Jet" magazines and BET Television are 'racist' or 'reverse racist.' Limbaugh and Newt have gone so far as to call Sotomayor herself a "racist." (As opposed to merely stating that her *remarks* were racist. I suppose an argument can be made that such a distinction is splitting hairs.)

I guess I'm not surprised to hear such nonsense from Rush Limbaugh -- I'm definitely not surprised to hear it from the likes of the non-serious Ann Coulter -- but I'm a bit surprised that Newt Gingrich would sink to such despicable rhetorical depths.

And what's so wrong about saying that the circuit courts are where "policy is made?" (If people bother listening to the full quote, she goes on to say that she's not advocating it.) But what's so *wrong* with the statement? As I believe Rachel Maddow pointed out this week, by their very nature, court rulings can precipitate *policies*. Everyone knows that giving the 'Miranda warning' to criminal suspects is the *policy* of every law enforcement agency in this country. Where do people think the universality of this policy originated? (To be more precise: why do people think it *is* a *uniform, universal policy*?)

(No, I'm not saying the 'goal' of a court should be to 'make policy' or that 'making law' is the proper role of the judiciary. And I don't think that's what Sotomayor was saying. I'm just saying that an argument can be made that Sotomayor's remarks on 'policy' and the circuit courts were not *per se* incorrect or so off-the-wall.)

Thank you. I'll be back later and take some calls.

Brady
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