The Death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg: Left Now Will Pay Price for Turning Courts into Political Battlefield
Republicans have no choice but to move ahead with a nomination, hearings, and vote.
by Doug Bandow
September 19, 2020, 9:00 AM
As news of the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg spread, the left-wing twittersphere exploded. Ginsburg was widely seen as single-handedly holding back the blood-thirsty reactionary Trump-crazy hordes. The Independent’s Holly Baxter lamented: “Sometimes it felt like she was America’s last hope.†Ginsburg’s passing loosed fear, frustration, anger, and defiance among the liberal legions.
The politics of her replacement immediately dominated their thoughts. Many cited as holy doctrine her comment, reported by her granddaughter: “My most fervent wish is that I will not be replaced until a new president is installed.†Others insisted that if Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell had a shred of decency — which they all agreed that he obviously did not — he would not seek to fill her seat before the election. Many remained traumatized over the failure to confirm Merrick Garland and losing “their†seat.
In fact, it is sad that a life so well lived did not benefit from even the shortest decent interval before considering the politics. Ginsburg was smart, determined, principled, resilient, and decent. A pathbreaker at a time when women were rare in the bar and on the bench, she was warm and collegial, her friendship with Antonin Scalia gaining particular attention. They could engage in rhetorical battle in the morning and attend opera together at night. The ability to not only respect but befriend those with whom one profoundly disagrees is something to be treasured.
However, the politics is impossible to ignore. And the fault lies with the Left. Marxists of all sorts never viewed the courts as anything but tools of oppression, that had to be manipulated to advance the revolution. Alas, modern liberals also abandoned fidelity to the rule of law in reality if not rhetoric. Their commitment to a “living constitution†— the evolving meaning of which depended upon any number of factors, including, it sometimes seemed, sunspots and the phase of the moon — turned them into politicians and the courts into continuing constitutional conventions.
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https://spectator.org/the-death-of-ruth-bader-ginsburg-left-now-will-pay-price-for-turning-courts-into-political-battlefield/
