By now you will doubtless have read that US Supreme Court Associate Justice Samuel Alito supposedly mouthed the words "not true" in response to President Barack Obama's criticism of the Supreme Court's recent Citizens United decision. Glenn Greenwald criticizes Alito, observing that:
There's a reason that Supreme Court Justices -- along with the Joint Chiefs of Staff -- never applaud or otherwise express any reaction at a State of the Union address. It's vital -- both as a matter of perception and reality -- that those institutions remain apolitical, separate and detached from partisan wars. The Court's pronouncements on (and resolutions of) the most inflammatory and passionate political disputes retain legitimacy only if they possess a credible claim to being objectively grounded in law and the Constitution, not political considerations. The Court's credibility in this regard has -- justifiably -- declined substantially over the past decade, beginning with Bush v. Gore (where 5 conservative Justices issued a ruling ensuring the election of a Republican President), followed by countless 5-4 decisions in which conservative Justices rule in a way that promotes GOP political beliefs, while the more "liberal" Justices do to the reverse (Citizens United is but the latest example).
I agree with Greenwald that Alito's reaction was inappropriate, but I disagree with Greenwald's remedy. I think the core of the problem is that the Supreme Court is not "apolitical, separate and detached from partisan wars." Since the Warren Court era, the SCOTUS has routinely seen fit to weigh in as the final arbiter of one political and cultural debate after another. The solution therefore is simple: Unless the plain text of the Constitution as understood by the Framers is being violated, the SCOTUS ought to leave "inflammatory and passionate political disputes" to the political sphere.
As I wrote some years ago in an Examiner column:
Former Democratic Congressman, Clinton Administration White House Counsel and federal judge Abner Mikva once explained that: "I support the result of Roe v. Wade. … But … in retrospect, I wish the court had stayed its hand and allowed the political process to continue, because we would have legislated the effect of Roe v. Wade in most states — not all of them, but in most states — and we wouldn’t have had to pay the political price we’ve had to pay for it being a court decision. The people who are angry at that court are angry beyond measure. As far as they are concerned the whole system is rotten because they’ve lost their opportunity to slug it out."
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has likewise stated that "Roe v. Wade ... halted a political process that was moving in a reform direction and thereby, I believe, prolonged divisiveness and deferred stable settlement of the issue."
Because it is custom, tradition, and long familiar patterns that enable people to live together peaceably, social change needs to come slowly. Change and progress are necessary, of course, but sudden change disrupts social bonds, induces stress and engenders controversy as old and vested interests are upset.
Sudden change by a cabal of unelected and largely unaccountable judges is particularly likely to engender controversy. Again, I’ll let Judge Mikva explain: "I don’t think it’s an accident that our founders put the legislative branch in the first article of the Constitution. The reason is that they perceived it to be the first among equals. Most of the people who’d been in Philadelphia had been members of the colonial legislatures, had been members of the Continental Congress, of the early congresses, and they understood the legislative process. They knew how it worked, and they recognized that there was a direct tie between where the people were and where the legislative branch was. They … were nervous about the judges because the English judges had not been an unmixed blessing as far as the colonies were concerned."
The founders knew, like Spiderman, that "with great power comes great responsibility." They ensured that Congress and the President could be held to account. If you don’t like what Congress is doing, you can vote for legislators you like better. You can contribute to candidates all over the country who share your views (of course, your ability to do so is limited because our judges have decided that political campaign contributions deserve less First Amendment protection than, say, child porn). You can give to 527 organizations that will promote your agenda. And so on.
Unfortunately, perhaps because they could not envision the extent to which modern judges would assert control over virtually all aspects of society and culture, the Founders failed to provide adequate accountability mechanisms. If you don’t like what the Supreme Court does, tough. All you can hope is that you can elect leaders who will eventually replace enough of those nine unelected old men and women with individuals whose views are more to your liking. ...
The time is fast approaching when the preservation of democracy will require the creation of new mechanisms for holding judges to account. Term limits might be a good place to start. Until then, however, we must rely on judges to exercise self-restraint. We must hope that judges can tell the difference between cases where intervention is necessary and appropriate, like Brown v. Board of Education, and cases that should remain in the political arena.
