MORE tRUMP LOSING: Conservative Activists and Pundits Are Melting Down Over Gorsuch’s Embrace of LGBTQ Rights
After spending millions to get him on the court, judicial activists are feeling betrayed.
By JEREMY STAHL
JUNE 15, 20202:04 PM
slate.com
Sharing words with “the enemy.”
Brendan Smialowski/Getty Images
On Monday, Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch betrayed the Constitution and the great cause of equality for which so many civil rights leaders fought, according to a number of really distraught conservative judicial activists.
Joined by fellow conservative Chief Justice John Roberts and the court’s progressive wing, Gorsuch issued a landmark 6–3 ruling that Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act prevents employers from discriminating against workers because they are gay or transgender, paving the way for breakthrough employment protections for LGBTQ people around the country.
As Mark Joseph Stern explained, the justices followed a straightforward legal theory that the portion of the Civil Rights Act that prohibits discrimination “because of sex” encompassed discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity. It’s impossible for an employer to discriminate against a gay or transgender person without taking into account the person’s sex, which would mean discriminating on that basis, Gorsuch reasoned.
This did not sit well with the conservative legal activists who put time, energy, and vast amounts of money into securing Gorsuch’s confirmation to replace Justice Antonin Scalia at the start of President Donald Trump’s term.
Gorsuch’s Monday opinion apparently enraged Carrie Severino, the president of the Judicial Crisis Network, an organization that reportedly spent $10 million to secure Gorsuch’s confirmation in 2017 and promised another $10 million to secure Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s in 2018. Severino accused Gorsuch of ruling “for the sake of appealing to college campuses and editorial boards” in “a brute force attack on our constitutional system.”
Carrie Severino@JCNSeverino
Justice Scalia would be disappointed that his successor has bungled textualism so badly today, for the sake of appealing to college campuses and editorial boards.
This was not judging, this was legislating—a brute force attack on our constitutional system. (1/x)
4,712
7:32 AM - Jun 15, 2020
Twitter Ads info and privacy
4,017 people are talking about this
Perhaps most offensive of all to Severino was that Gorsuch, in issuing his opinion, cited Scalia’s “textualist” judicial philosophy of seeking to interpret the plain meaning of the words of a statute at the time it was written. As she dramatically put it: “This is an ominous sign for anyone concerned about the future of representative democracy.”
Carrie Severino@JCNSeverino
7h
Replying to @JCNSeverino
Today six judges acting as advocates opted to rewrite the statute themselves, short-circuiting the legislative process and in the process denying the people a decision that should be theirs to make on a major issue. (3/x)
Carrie Severino@JCNSeverino
Have no doubts about what happened today: This was the hijacking of textualism.
You can't redefine the meaning of words themselves and still be doing textualism. This is an ominous sign for anyone concerned about the future of representative democracy. (end)
1,356
7:32 AM - Jun 15, 2020
Twitter Ads info and privacy
1,057 people are talking about this
And it wasn’t just Severino who was worried about what would become of democracy now.
New York Post op-ed editor Sohrab Ahmari—most famous for his position that liberal democracy is beginning to get in the way of conservatives’ ability to go about “defeating the enemy and enjoying the spoils in the form of a public square re-ordered to the common good”—was frustrated as well.
Sohrab Ahmari
?@SohrabAhmari
Today is a great day for men, not so great for women.
67
7:32 AM - Jun 15, 2020
Twitter Ads info and privacy
16 people are talking about this
Sohrab Ahmari
?@SohrabAhmari
I hate to do this, but as the country ballad says, "I told you soooooo!" t.co
Pat Smith@smithpatrick08
Replying to @smithpatrick08
I just hope @SohrabAhmari and @Vermeullarmine let me attend the ceremony where their opponents surrender.
24
7:25 AM - Jun 15, 2020
Twitter Ads info and privacy
See Sohrab Ahmari's other Tweets
The joint frustrations of the conservative institutionalists vs. the anti-institutionalists resulted in a bit of maudlin backbiting over what exactly went wrong today.
Carrie Severino@JCNSeverino
This wasn't originalism that failed us.
This was an imposter parading as originalism. t.co
Sohrab Ahmari
?@SohrabAhmari
Originalism has failed you exactly as @Vermeullarmine predicted it would.
45
8:12 AM - Jun 15, 2020
Twitter Ads info and privacy
54 people are talking about this
Ahmari’s arguments for the reactionary and anti-majoritarian politics of Trumpism seem to be gaining the upper hand after Monday. Daily Caller columnist Saurabh Sharma was calling for open defiance of Monday’s ruling in Bostock v. Clayton County and other legal opinions adverse to the conservative cause of preventing equal rights for gay and transgender people.
Saurabh Sharma@ssharmaTX
Also, to everyone impotently whining about how “we should make the court less important” today:
The only path to do that is open defiance of black-robed supremacy. Unless you’re willing to endorse that, I don’t want to hear your hand-wringing over the trajectory of our republic. t.co
Saurabh Sharma@ssharmaTX
Replying to @ssharmaTX
The Courts were never going to save us. Our project as conservatives is to curb their worst excesses, get them out of our way, and when that fails, seek the ultimate vindication of our convictions by defying them in the name of constitutional order.
25
8:41 AM - Jun 15, 2020
Twitter Ads info and privacy
27 people are talking about this
Saurabh Sharma@ssharmaTX
· 7h
For my friends disappointed by today’s court decision, you don’t have to necessarily reach for the most extreme judicial worldview you can find next like it’s a drug that just doesn’t hit the same anymore.
There is another way. t.co
Josh Hammer
?@josh_hammer
Replying to @josh_hammer
One path forward from this abyss: Combine defiance of judicial supremacy with “common good originalism.” americanmind.org …
Saurabh Sharma@ssharmaTX
The Courts were never going to save us. Our project as conservatives is to curb their worst excesses, get them out of our way, and when that fails, seek the ultimate vindication of our convictions by defying them in the name of constitutional order.
29
8:18 AM - Jun 15, 2020
Twitter Ads info and privacy
18 people are talking about this
Historically, nullification has offered a mixed bag in terms of success, failing at the practical level of the ability to outright defy laws while occasionally pushing the courts toward judicial accommodations for those doing the defying that have long-lasting impacts.
Still, the concept was all the rage on Twitter on Monday. As the opinion editor of Newsweek, Josh Hammer put it:
Josh Hammer
?@josh_hammer
Going to re-up this call to defy judicial supremacy. t.co
Josh Hammer
?@josh_hammer
I’m delighted to share with y’all that my first formal piece of legal scholarship is now out at the University of St. Thomas Law Journal.
*Standing Athwart History: Anti-Obergefell Popular Constitutionalism and Judicial Supremacy's Long-Term Triumph* ir.stthomas.edu …
71
7:31 AM - Jun 15, 2020
Twitter Ads info and privacy
49 people are talking about this
Hammer was similarly grave about the consequences of the decision for the legitimacy of particular justices who were recently put forward by the conservative movement:
Josh Hammer
?@josh_hammer
The crisis moment for the “conservative legal movement” has arrived.
The Roe v. Wade of religious liberty is here, and it was delivered by golden boy Neil Gorsuch.
What comes next?
690
7:14 AM - Jun 15, 2020
Twitter Ads info and privacy
482 people are talking about this
by Taboola
Sponsored Links
You May Like
Brilliant New N95 Sports Masks Sweeping USKiera Store
Artillery® Sidewinder ...Banggood
The Women That Tiger Woods Betrayed His Wife WithPenguin M.D.
Josh Hammer
?@josh_hammer
For the record, I wrote numerous pieces at the time arguing for Bill Pryor over Neil Gorsuch.
238
7:20 AM - Jun 15, 2020
Twitter Ads info and privacy
59 people are talking about this
Indeed, he thought the whole thing was a joke:
Josh Hammer
?@josh_hammer
Conservative LOLegal Movement
107
7:24 AM - Jun 15, 2020
Twitter Ads info and privacy
26 people are talking about this
Meanwhile, senior editor at the Conservative Review Daniel Horowitz endorsed Hammer’s notion that the Republican Party writ large—as embodied by its choices of Supreme Court justices—had failed the conservative movement.
Daniel Horowitz
?@RMConservative
To shield Democrats from the inevitable revolt the American people would organize against them and take the blame instead. t.co
Josh Hammer
?@josh_hammer
What is the point of the Republican Party?
157
7:29 AM - Jun 15, 2020
Twitter Ads info and privacy
71 people are talking about this
Hammer, for his part, was so angry about the news that he even attacked one of the dissenting justices, Brett Kavanaugh. Despite saying he would rule against the rights of LGBTQ people in this case, Kavanaugh apparently committed the sin in Hammer’s eyes of not being mean enough to them in doing it.
Kavanaugh wrote that “notwithstanding my concern about the Court’s transgression of the Constitution’s separation of powers, it is appropriate to acknowledge the important victory achieved today by gay and lesbian Americans. … [They] can take pride in today’s result.”
As Hammer responded to these empty words in a since-deleted tweet:
So even one of the three dissenters feels compelled to flaunt his virtue for the mob. There are literally two good justices on the Court: Thomas and Alito. The “conservative legal movement” is a failure.
Ultimately, though, the frustration of these conservatives seems very likely to be short-lived. The Supreme Court and its conservative majority are set this term to decide a raft of major cases, including one that could overturn a landmark abortion decision upholding and bolstering Planned Parenthood v. Casey and Roe v. Wade that was decided just four years ago. There is more than enough time in the remainder of this term for Gorsuch to vindicate himself in the eyes of his—for today—very distraught benefactors. |
