Earl Warren's greatest contribution to Supreme Court history and jurisprudence was to take it out of its bubble and slowly, deliberately, expose it to the consequences of its decisions. He worked on the Justices for a year to get a unanimous opinion in Brown. It also helped that he had justices with life experience like Thurgood Marshall.I don't think people should protest Kavanaugh's house.
— emptywheel (@emptywheel) May 8, 2022
But a reminder that a pro-Flynn QAnoner threatened to assassinate Emmet Sullivan and the Proud Boys helped Roger Stone to make a death threat targeting Amy Berman Jackson. https://t.co/Ftro4NMVfo
Too many of the justices on the Supreme Court today have limited judicial experience (or almost none) and have spent their careers before being elevated to the high court in academia or non-practice fields. They live and die by their ideology, not by the effects of judicial opinions on real lives.
I don't really mind that they are getting some feedback and finding out they aren't the objective arbiters of the law before whom all bow in fealty.
If the protests become real threats of violence against individuals, that will become a criminal matter. We have processes for handling that, too.
But protesting outside Kavanaugh's house? Good to let him know he lives in a country with 350 million other citizens, and remind him that he is not first among equals or worse, superior to the rabble.
They are a political institution that is shielded from the voters, they should have to face the political consequences of their actions and this is the only way to do that.
ReplyDeleteConsidering what happened to Dr. Blasey Ford, he's getting off easy. It's his side that credibly threatens the lives of families. Thanks in no small part to the Supreme Court Second Amendment rulings of recent years.