A dramatic event happened in US politics this weekend – the
death of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, and the political fallout that
then occurred.
It was an event to me mainly because he was the first
Supreme Court Justice that I remember going through the confirmation
process. He was appointed in 1986 by
Ronald Reagan, when I was 15 years old and just learning about national
government (in part due to my participation in Boy Scouts). I didn’t follow his nomination and
appointment very closely, but I learned enough to be very interested by both
the Robert Bork nomination and again with David Souter a few years later, which
I followed closely.
Justice Scalia’s passing was a surprise (and a blow to
relative conservatives like me), but more surprising was the reaction from the
various presidential candidates.
Immediately after his passing (the same night, in fact) several
candidates for the Republican nomination came out and said that no nominee by
President Obama should be confirmed by the Senate, as is required by the US
Constitution.
To me, this is a twofold mistake, both in policy and
politics. On policy, it’s a rejection of
the principles of the Constitution, which enumerates powers of the President
(including supreme court nominations) for the entire four years of his term,
not just the three years (and shrinking!) before the election cycle starts. As
of right now, there are not even nominees to replace the president when his
term ends, and the election cycle has been running since June of last year, so
the idea that a president could not successfully nominate a SCOTUS justice is
to de facto shorten the term of the
President. (Two notes; First, Justice
Scalia himself, as a strict constructionist, would have hated the idea that the
Constitution would be overridden by political considerations. Second, there is an unwritten rule called the
“Thurmond Rule” about nominating a justice at the end of one’s term. It’s a bad rule, and too early to invoke it
anyway).
Second, politically.
By rejecting the nomination of any justice before it’s even been made,
the Republicans are handing their Democrat opponents an easy issue with which
to beat them. The statement that the
Republicans are willing to circumvent the Constitution or thwart the will of
the people to get their way is almost too easy, and will energize the base of
Democrat voters who don’t trust the Republicans to run the government. It could also lead to a groundswell of
independent voters who will feel the same way, and at a minimum, who may vote
for a Republican president, but also a Democrat Senate to keep the power of the
President in check. (Note: candidate Ted
Cruz has stated he would filibuster a nominee himself – if he were to do that,
it would be the end of his viability as a candidate; Americans do not want to
see paralysis in their government.)
I, for one, am actually writing to my Senators, urging them
to put aside election year politics, and abide by the authority given to them
by the Constitution. President Obama
clearly has the right to nominate a justice to SCOTUS, and the Senate has an
obligation to confirm or reject the candidate on the merits of the candidate
only, and not their politics. If the one
hundred (or so) Senators cannot see their way to carry out this responsibility,
they have no place holding their office.
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