Supreme Court justices keep many opinions private but Sandra Day O’Connor no longer faces that obligation. Yesterday, the retired justice criticized Republicans who criticized the courts. She said they challenge the independence of judges and the freedoms of all Americans. In an unusually forceful and forthright speech, O’Connor said that attacks on the judiciary by some Republican leaders pose a direct threat to our constitutional freedoms. O’Connor began by conceding that courts do have the power to make presidents or the Congress or governors, as she put it “really, really angry.” But, she continued, if we don’t make them mad some of the time we probably aren’t doing our jobs as judges, and our effectiveness, she said, is premised on the notion that we won’t be subject to retaliation for our judicial acts. The nation’s founders wrote repeatedly, she said, that without an independent judiciary to protect individual rights from the other branches of government those rights and privileges would amount to nothing. But, said O’Connor, as the founding fathers knew statutes and constitutions don’t protect judicial independence, people do.
I just wish that she could have said some of this before we ended up with a second term by George Bush and a new Supreme court which seems to exist solely to strike down Roe v. Wade. I know that we have many years of these Bush appointees trampling over our civil rights to regret as well as allowing the Republicans to steal those last two fateful elections. We really could have used an outspoken supreme court judge back then.
Update: She also said this; Pointing to the experiences of developing countries and formerly Communist countries, where interference with an independent judiciary has allowed dictatorship to flourish, O’Connor said we must be ever vigilant against those who would strong-arm the judiciary into adopting their preferred policies. It takes a lot of degeneration before a country falls into dictatorship she said, but we should avoid these ends by avoiding these beginnings.
Ooooh she said the "D" word!
Hat tip to you, Gryphen, for talking about this..Now let me wag my finger for a moment..EVERYONE should be talking about this speech. It's huge!
ReplyDeleteAs for the regrets you expressed that O'Connor didn't speak out prior to retiring--that's the downfall of a principled jurist, isn't it? (In)justice Scalia, who gives speeches all the time to uber-conservative lackeys, often calling people whose views differ from his "idiots," bears no resemblance whatsoever to a "principled jurist."
I disagreed with O'Connor's take on several cases over the years, but I have been continually compelled to respect and admire her restraint, integrity and principles. Would that the same could be said for the likes of Scalia and Thomas.
She is a day late and a dollar short.
ReplyDeleteShe voted with the Supreme Court majority to install Bush in Bush v. Gore, so she shares responsibilty for unleashing the demons who are trying to destroy in independent judiciary.
ReplyDeleteCrocodile tears from O'Connor.
I'm glad to see former Justice O'Conner take on the right-wing ideologues who attack the judiciary for simply doing its job, but like one of your previous writers, I find her comments a bit disingenuous coming as they do from a member of the majority in Bush v. Gore. She was always sceptical of broad "equal protection" claims such as those made by Bush, and, in cases like Florida Seminole and Alden v. Maine, as well as many others, she voted to limit the role of the federal government in areas which are traditionally the province of the states. When, however, a decision of the Florida Supreme Court would have given the 2000 election to a Democrat, this Republican justice abandoned her life-long judicial philosopy to give power to the party which had been making precisely the attacks on the judiciary which she now decries.
ReplyDeleteJohn Lennon would have called it karma.
Thanks for your posting, Gryphen. Keep the faith, stay mad as hell and keep warm!
ReplyDeletePerhaps she now regrets her role in deciding Bush v. Gore and is trying to make amends.
ReplyDeleteWhat I am afraid of is that some wacked out wing nut will attack one of the more liberal justices like Souter or Stevens.