OP-ED: Three women lighting the Supreme darkness
The new liberal wing of the Supreme Court, if all goes according to White House plan, will be just three women justices defending the Democratic fort of democracy.
Three women aligned with no men on the same side: That’s a first in making (or breaking) American history. They are a Latina, Sonia Sotomayor; a Jewish woman, Elena Kagan; and an unknown Black female judge, whom President Joe Biden expects to name this month.
Is there a bright side to a 6-3 Supreme Court, with Republican Chief Justice John Roberts leading the charge against progressive laws?
Outnumbered, these three women can etch the gulf between the parties in crystal clear color. They may be the light in the Supreme Court’s heart of darkness.
Perhaps they’ll speak to the public square, in a righteous chord that sounds beyond the dry realm of law to live up to the name of justice.
Roe v. Wade is likely up next on the Court’s chopping block. It will be imperative for these three women to uphold that reproductive rights are human rights.
Rich diversity from different walks of life – Black, Latina and Jewish – is something Biden and Senate Democrats should embrace and celebrate.
The president promised to change the pool of usual suspects for his pick. Besides, to appoint the arch-conservative Clarence Thomas to fill the great Thurgood Marshall’s seat was a blow long ago to the Black community and civil rights movement.
It’s all good, to show and tell the American people that Democrats are the party that walks the walk and “looks like America.” The phrase originally came from former President Bill Clinton.
Sotomayor, Kagan and a Black woman justice may make the most of their minority status. Like Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a rock star in judicial robes for her eloquent dissents, I expect they’ll make their collective presence felt in a sea of Catholic conservatism.
Their life experiences as women will certainly bind them together in a garment of inclusion and cohesion.
Remember, three of the six Republican justices were confirmed in former President Donald Trump’s one term. Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett are the Trump Three, the most partisan threesome in history. It’s a badge of shame they should never be allowed to forget.
Roberts, who once clerked for Chief Justice William Rehnquist, puts a pleasant veneer on the Supreme Court’s most outrageous rulings. Citizens United opened the gates of dark money into campaigns. In 2013, the Supreme Court struck down the heart of voting rights. They have hurt a healthy body politic by ending fair play, especially on race and elections.
Justice Stephen Breyer’s retirement, announced last week, opened the way for the triumvirate of women named by Democratic presidents on the bench. Like the late giant, Ginsburg, he was named by Clinton.
“The more women, the better,” Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., said.
Three women will hold the fort versus five angry men and a woman named by Trump while Ginsburg’s body was virtually warm in the parlor.
An ultraconservative Hoosier, Barrett didn’t bat an eye at swearing in a week ahead of Election Day 2020. (“I’m saving her for Ginsburg,” Trump crassly said.)
While her president lost, Barrett won a lifetime post. She’s 50.
Biden should name his nominee forthwith, to cut off Republican headwinds sure to blow from Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell’s office. Sooner is better. Still, it could be a pitchfork battle.
Plainly put, this Supreme Court is antediluvian. Some say rogue. Roberts may yet earn his place in history next to Roger Taney, author of the antebellum Dred Scott ruling that held that Black people could never be citizens. They often seize on cases for political purposes.
Breyer couldn’t contain his disbelief when colleagues ruled against the federal mask mandate to keep workplaces safer in the pandemic.
If the mystery justice came from west of the Mississippi River, not Harvard or Yale, that too would diversify the Court. At least, we’ll know she didn’t go to Georgetown Prep, the all-male, plush Catholic school (near Washington) that formed Gorsuch and Kavanaugh.
Elite Ivy is growing out of the Court, sinking fast in the public eye. We desperately need Biden’s nominee, whoever she may be.
Jamie Stiehm is a nationally syndicated columnist. She may be reached at JamieStiehm.com.