Posted by
Philip Mella on Monday, July 13, 2009 3:27:53 PM
Say you are an American of Irish descent, and you were interviewing for an important job and, in discussing your skills and abilities, you mentioned that you were a wise Irishman, and you feel that more favorably positioned you for the job than an American of African ancestry. Do you think your chances to land the position would be improved or diminished?
An irony of President Obama's Supreme Court nominee, Sonia Sotomayor, is that it's the cynical and balkanizing affirmative action apparatus, with its craven focus on ethnicity, and which stand in stark contrast to our Constitution, Bill of Rights, and the Declaration of Independence, that is providing the cultural--not Constitutional--basis for her prospective senate approval. The notion that judicial decisions should be rendered by judges who employ their ethnicity (or gender, for that matter) as a substantive criterion in the legal process is the height of cultural corruption.
Dr. Martin Luther King effectively gave his life to champion the principles of a color-blind society, where people are judged not on the color of their skin but by the content of their character. The corrosive effect of a Sotomayor on the bench of the nation's highest court is not merely legal in nature, but also civic and, as noted, cultural. The requirement of equal treatment before the law, the distortion of which led her to ignore the constitutional issues in the Ricci case, would be routinely jeopardized, as would a host of other legal and Constitutional protections.
Intertwined in the legal bastardization of our system would be the insidious references to and endorsement of 'international law,' which is a legal blank slate that would permit every manner of abuse under the mantle of a 'higher authority.' The fact that such invocations undermine American sovereignty is of no concern to the liberal sensibility because its goal is not a mindful respect of our laws but rather the subversion of our laws to achieve a kind of global system of jurisprudence.
The suspect nature of Sotomayor's legall reasoning is evident in cases reviewed by the Supreme Court:
• Ricci v. DeStefano 530 F.3d 87 (2008)
--REVERSED 5-4
• Riverkeeper, Inc. vs. EPA, 475 F.3d 83 (2007)
-- REVERSED 6-3 (Dissenting: Stevens, Souter, Ginsburg)
• Knight vs. Commissioner, 467 F.3d 149 (2006)
-- upheld, but REASONING WAS UNANIMOUSLY FAULTED
• Dabit vs. Merrill Lynch, 395 F.3d 25 (2005)
-- REVERSED 8-0
• Empire Healthchoice Assurance, Inc. vs. McVeigh, 396 F.3d 136 (2005)
-- REVERSED 5-4 (Dissenting: Breyer, Kennedy, Souter, Alito)
• Malesko v. Correctional Services Corp., 299 F.3d 374 (2000)
-- REVERSED 5-4 (Dissenting: Stevens, Souter, Ginsburg, Breyer)
• Tasini vs. New York Times, et al, 972 F. Supp. 804 (1997)
-- REVERSED 7-2 (Dissenting: Stevens, Breyer)
Not surprising, what we're reaping today was sown into the framework of our judicial system many decades ago. Today we call it 'judicial activism,' but in the 1930s it was known as 'legal realism.' Either way, it's a tacit support for judicial decisions predicated on results, not on the legal merits of the case.
That's why 'stare decisis' is so crucial in judicial decisions. The notion that judicial precedent should be strictly or loosely observed is linearly related to intended outcomes, and cases can be argued both directions based on the case law cited. Cultural fashion oughtn't but does play a key role in this process, and liberal activists defend it by reference to a more nuanced--read more sophisticated--outcome, compromises to Constitutional precepts notwithstanding.
The liberal establishment, with the public school system in the vanguard and flanked by the media and popular culture, is a daunting force for post-modernism and moral relativism. Standing one's ground on principle, in particular without regard to political consequences, requires a level of heroism that is as rare as it is commendable. Sotomayor will win confirmation, but the costs in terms of the degradation of our Constitution and its downstream adverse impacts in our civic lives, will echo for decades to come.