Charlie's observation on the politically intractable mess in Wisconsin is a perfect example of why people of good conscience on both sides of the aisle must come to see the Federalist Society, and every other politically ideological legal society, for what they are: dangerous threats to a healthy democracy.
Charlie's observation on the politically intractable mess in Wisconsin is a perfect example of why people of good conscience on both sides of the aisle must come to see the Federalist Society, and every other politically ideological legal society, for what they are: dangerous threats to a healthy democracy.
I don't know enough about legal history to say this for sure, but I imagine our current Supreme Court is the first which can be legitimately said to have been engineered by an outside interest group. We were told time and again that this group was committed to *judicial* conservatism, not *social* or *political* conservatism. Even if that were technically true, this turned out to be a distinction without a difference. The overwhelming intersection between the judicial vs. social/political camps lent itself to an obvious right-wing culture among jurists and lawyers who willingly segregated themselves from their legal peers.
The result has been more than just a nominal judicial philosophy in service to a political agenda. It was a loss of something important that we could once reasonably rely upon from our courts: wisdom. I was gob-smacked when John Roberts claimed it was not a job for the courts to adjudicate the fairness of gerrymandered districts. *Of course* it was a job for the courts - not because it was ever plainly stated in a document, but because they were the only ones who possibly could. Because democracy is helpless to correct a political system that has been specifically re-engineered to thwart democracy itself.
Was it not this implicit understanding of the courts *practical* duties which led to the concept of judicial review itself, despite not being mentioned in the Constitution? Even if we credulously accept the lack of political motive, should the Court's seeming humility, when faced with the knowledge of the sclerotic and dysfunctional political institutions to which they sanctimoniously defer, not be seen as, in fact, a dereliction of duty?
Our courts have long been viewed as a bulwark against the evils of partisanship. They have been revered precisely because they have been seen as apolitical - and consequently our polity looks to them to be the referees in the game of politics, regardless of how grounded this role may or may not be in historical texts. The collective wisdom of the courts, when informed by an apolitical culture, acknowledged this expectation. That they accepted the role was evident in their informal reasoning: "The Constitution is not a suicide pact", being perhaps its most emblematic example. If you don't want your drunk friends to die, and to possibly take others with them, you grab the keys even when you aren't the designated driver.
Charlie's observation on the politically intractable mess in Wisconsin is a perfect example of why people of good conscience on both sides of the aisle must come to see the Federalist Society, and every other politically ideological legal society, for what they are: dangerous threats to a healthy democracy.
I don't know enough about legal history to say this for sure, but I imagine our current Supreme Court is the first which can be legitimately said to have been engineered by an outside interest group. We were told time and again that this group was committed to *judicial* conservatism, not *social* or *political* conservatism. Even if that were technically true, this turned out to be a distinction without a difference. The overwhelming intersection between the judicial vs. social/political camps lent itself to an obvious right-wing culture among jurists and lawyers who willingly segregated themselves from their legal peers.
The result has been more than just a nominal judicial philosophy in service to a political agenda. It was a loss of something important that we could once reasonably rely upon from our courts: wisdom. I was gob-smacked when John Roberts claimed it was not a job for the courts to adjudicate the fairness of gerrymandered districts. *Of course* it was a job for the courts - not because it was ever plainly stated in a document, but because they were the only ones who possibly could. Because democracy is helpless to correct a political system that has been specifically re-engineered to thwart democracy itself.
Was it not this implicit understanding of the courts *practical* duties which led to the concept of judicial review itself, despite not being mentioned in the Constitution? Even if we credulously accept the lack of political motive, should the Court's seeming humility, when faced with the knowledge of the sclerotic and dysfunctional political institutions to which they sanctimoniously defer, not be seen as, in fact, a dereliction of duty?
Our courts have long been viewed as a bulwark against the evils of partisanship. They have been revered precisely because they have been seen as apolitical - and consequently our polity looks to them to be the referees in the game of politics, regardless of how grounded this role may or may not be in historical texts. The collective wisdom of the courts, when informed by an apolitical culture, acknowledged this expectation. That they accepted the role was evident in their informal reasoning: "The Constitution is not a suicide pact", being perhaps its most emblematic example. If you don't want your drunk friends to die, and to possibly take others with them, you grab the keys even when you aren't the designated driver.