Asking The Wrong Question

As the Senate “considers” the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh (note quotation marks, since  support for this particular nominee is entirely partisan and no genuine consideration of his record is being allowed), much of the focus is on his presumed “pro life” approach to cases involving abortion.

Media framing of this issue highlights the most frustrating element of America’s “pro-choice” or “pro-life” public debate:  the persistent refusal to confront the actual question, which is not whether a pregnant woman should continue or terminate her pregnancy.

The question is: who should have the power to make that decision? 

As I have repeatedly argued, a government with the authority to forbid abortion is a government with the authority to require it. I usually point to China, where the government has done precisely that, but yesterday, my lawyer son pointed me to a case right here in the good old U.S. of A.– and a judicial decision by none other than Brett Kavanaugh.

As Salon reported, 

In 2007, as an appellate judge in Washington, D.C., Kavanaugh was presented with an unusual case involving two women who had wanted to continue their pregnancies but had been forced to have abortions instead. They sued and Kavanaugh ruled against them, denying their claims that they had a right to be consulted about the decision to terminate their pregnancies.

Many Americans, probably most, understand the abortion debate to be about a struggle between the right of women to bodily autonomy and the “right to life” that anti-choicers claim embryos and fetuses have. In reality, as this case shows, the legal debate is really only about autonomy — so much so that an anti-choice judge like Kavanaugh ruled against women who wanted  to “choose life,” as conservatives say, rather than allow them a greater measure of autonomy….

The case is a complex one, but the basic story involved three women who received care from the District of Columbia Mental Retardation and Developmental Disabilities Administration. All three women had intellectual disabilities and had been determined legally incompetent. One woman had an elective eye surgery and two had abortions, all chosen for them without any consideration of their wishes. The women argued that they had a right to have their wishes considered, but Kavanaugh ruled against them….

Legal standards regarding who is competent to make medical decisions for themselves are complicated and vary quite a bit from state to state. But Mathis said that even in states that have the fewest autonomy rights for people with certain disabilities, “most courts consider the person’s wishes,” even if they may ultimately rule against them. Kavanaugh, however, “just rejected the notion that there was any reason at all” to ask the women in that case what they wanted.

I emphasized that last line, because it illuminates what is truly at stake in these arguments. The question is not “to abort or not to abort.” The question is: who decides? The Bill of Rights is essentially a list of things that government does not get to decide–what you read, what you believe, whether or to whom you pray. Government officials don’t get to decide to  search you (or your “papers or effects”) simply because you look shifty, or out of place, or because the officer “has a hunch.”

As snotty as the faux originalists are about the constitutional “penumbra” referenced in Roe, it is impossible to read through the Bill of Rights without recognizing that the entire document rests on the Founder’s concern to protect personal autonomy and to safeguard the right of individuals to make their own moral and political decisions–including what the Court has subsequently dubbed “intimate” decisions–free of government coercion or interference. The 9th and 10th Amendments make it clear that rights not “enumerated” (that is, not specifically listed) are not to be “denied or disparaged,” and that powers not specifically delegated to the central government are to be retained by the states and the people.

It is an act of intellectual dishonesty to dismiss the limits that the Bill of Rights places on government’s authority to control its citizens’ exercise of self-determination.

The question, I repeat, is not “what shall be decided?” but “who shall decide it?”

The question for Brett Kavanaugh is not whether he fancies himself “pro-life.” It is whether he is willing to acknowledge that the power of government to control women’s lives is limited by our constitution.

His jurisprudence makes it abundantly clear that he is not willing to make that acknowledgement. For that reason (and a number of other very troubling decisions he has handed down), he is unfit to sit on the nation’s highest court.

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A Partisan Supreme Court

Now that we know a bit more about the Federalist Society’s nominee, I guess it’s time to talk about the Supreme Court.

In no particular order, and for what they are worth, here are some observations about the Court, the process and this nominee.

The Supreme Court was not intended to be a “democratic” (small d) entity; quite the contrary. The judicial branch is supposed to be a nonpartisan constraint on majoritarian passions when those passions threaten Constitutional principles and the rule of law. That said, its judges are supposed to be broadly representative of the (best of) our citizenry.  This nominee is the choice of a President who lost the popular vote by a margin of nearly three million, and whose approval ratings have rarely exceeded 40%; if he is confirmed, it will be with the votes of Senators from states with (an arguably unrepresentative) 45% of the population.

As one legal scholar has commented (link unavailable),

I think we’d all agree that the nation has been fairly evenly divided, all things considered, in presidential and congressional elections over the past 50 years. Yet there has been a Republican-appointed majority of the Court for the past 47 years, and that’s likely to continue for at least another 20-30, if not more. It doesn’t much matter what label we use to describe our system, “democracy” or otherwise. The salient point is that it is very possible that for my entire adult life–even if I am fortunate to live to a ripe old age–the Justices will not have been representative of the nation, and will have been systematically skewed in one direction for the entire period.

Over at Balkinization, Mark Graber points to a conflict between this nominee’s actual–highly partisan– jurisprudence and the “cliches” he and Trump use to describe his judicial philosophy:

Donald Trump and Brett Kavanaugh offered the American people two clichés when describing how Supreme Court justices should decide cases.  The first is that they must interpret the Constitution as written.  The second is that they should use common sense.  One problem is that in many important cases the two conflict.  The more serious problem is that when the two conflict, Kavanaugh always selects the option that promotes Republican policies and politics.

In 2012, Stephen Pearlstein wrote a column about one of Kavanaugh’s decisions, a decision invalidating EPA regulations that had been the subject of exhaustive research, numerous hearings, and years of negotiations with industry and environmental groups. (I strongly encourage you to click through and read the whole column.) Reading Kavanaugh’s decision, Pearlstein says

You’d have no idea that, in earlier decisions, the same court had found it a reasonable formula resulting in reasonable compliance costs, but sent an earlier version back to be reworked because it didn’t make the air clean enough.

Instead, what you get is 60 pages of legal sophistry, procedural hair-splitting and scientific conjecture.

You find a judge without a shred of technical training formulating his own policy solution to an incredibly complex problem and substituting it for the solution proposed by experienced experts.

You find an appeals court judge so dismissive of the most fundamental rules of judicial restraint that he dares to throw out regulations on the basis of concerns never raised during the rule-making process or in the initial court appeal.

In other words, an arrogant and activist judge ruling on the basis of his personal political ideology.

Kavanaugh’s approach to gun laws also follows partisan predilections justified as respect for history and tradition. Because “semiautomatic rifles have not traditionally been banned and are in common use,” he has written,” they are protected under the Second Amendment.”

What happened to that professed commitment to common sense?

Perhaps the most comprehensive descriptions of Kavanaugh’s record–and reasons to oppose his elevation to the Court– are contained in a letter signed by hundreds of alumni of Yale and its law school. I strongly encourage reading that letter in its entirety, because it details numerous specific positions the judge has embraced (including his opposition to mandating coverage of pre-existing conditions by health insurance companies, and a truly bizarre opinion that Net Neutrality rules run afoul of the First Amendment). As the letter argues:

Support for Judge Kavanaugh is not apolitical. It is a political choice about the meaning of the constitution and our vision of democracy, a choice with real consequences for real people. Without a doubt, Judge Kavanaugh is a threat to the most vulnerable.

Much of the opposition to this appointment centers on Kavanaugh’s likely approach to Roe v. Wade. But Roe–which has already been “nibbled” to death in many states–is just the tip of a very large iceberg. Kavanaugh has consistently elevated religious doctrine over personal autonomy, and has disputed the existence of a wall of separation between church and state.

In the age of Trump, however, a position taken by Kavanaugh that I find even more chilling is his current view that Presidents should be above the law, at least while in office. As the Yale alumni wrote,

Judge Kavanaugh would also act as a rubber stamp for President Trump’s fraud and abuse. Despite working with independent counsel Ken Starr to prosecute Bill Clinton, Judge Kavanaugh has since called upon Congress to exempt sitting presidents from civil suits, criminal investigations, and criminal prosecutions. He has also noted that “a serious constitutional question exists regarding whether a president can be criminally indicted and tried while in office.” This reversal does not reflect high-minded consideration but rather naked partisanship. At a time when the President and his associates are under investigation for various serious crimes, including colluding with the Russian government and obstructing justice, Judge Kavanaugh’s extreme deference to the Executive poses a direct threat to our democracy.

Does Judge Kavanaugh have the credentials and intellect to serve on the Court? Certainly.

Does he have the intellectual humility and “spirit of liberty” that Learned Hand once defined as “the spirit which is not too sure that it is right… the spirit which seeks to understand the minds of other men and women… the spirit which weighs their interest alongside its own without bias”?

Not even close.

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Will Incompetence Save Us?

This Dana Milbank column on Betsy DeVos is nothing short of wonderful. For one thing, it is really funny, and laughs are hard to come by these days. Beyond the humor, however,  Milbank also offers a ray of hope in the wake of yesterday’s (bare) confirmation of DeVos as Secretary of Education. He begins:

Rarely is the question asked: Is our Cabinet secretaries learning?

And if we is being honest with ourself, we says: No, they is not.

Today’s lesson: the education of Betsy DeVos.

Anyone who hasn’t been hiding under a rock (and I’m not judging–hiding under a rock is perfectly understandable in the Age of Trump) knows at least four things about Betsy DeVos: 1) she is monumentally unqualified for her post; 2) she gave gazillions of dollars to a large number of the Republican Senators who voted to confirm her (Conflict of interest? What conflict of interest?); 3) she is a proponent of siphoning taxpayer dollars from public schools to support Christian schools via vouchers; and public opposition to her confirmation was more intense and widespread than most observers can ever recall seeing.

It took DeVos’ longtime collaborator and fellow culture-warrior Mike Pence to break a 50/50 tie and get her over the finish line.

Milbank has words of consolation for those of us who view DeVos as an unmitigated disaster.

Democrats in the long run may thank the majority Republicans for confirming DeVos. In the fight against President Trump’s agenda, the new administration’s incompetence is their friend. Trump’s choice of DeVos signals a dangerous desire to dismantle public schools. It would be more dangerous if he chose somebody who was up to the task.

As bad as DeVos is, Milbank points out that she is only marginally the worst of a crew that includes Ben Carson (at Housing and Urban Development because–hey!–he lives in a house), Rick Perry (who admitted he had no idea what the Department of Energy did) and others.

Heading the National Security Council is Mike Flynn, reportedly drummed out as head of the Defense Intelligence Agency for poor management. Nikki Haley, the U.N. ambassador, has no foreign policy experience; Treasury nominee Steven Mnuchin has no government experience and displayed his financial skills during his confirmation hearing by failing to disclose $100 million in personal assets.

One can already see future Cabinet meetings shaping up in the White House, as Trump goes around the table asking for updates:

Carson: “Pass.”

DeVos: “Could you come back to me, please?”

Flynn: “Sorry, what?”

Perry: “Oops.”

No doubt there is some value in nominating people outside the “establishment.” But the value is diminished if your outsiders can’t do the job.

Milbank noted that after Senate Democrats spent hours addressing DeVos’ manifest ignorance of even the most basic issues facing the Department of Education, John Cornyn’s response failed to rebut any of those charges. Instead he simply said that “The president will get the Cabinet he nominated and deserves.”

As Milbank concluded: Yes, he will.

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