From a 2005 essay written by Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch:
American liberals have become addicted to the courtroom, relying on judges and lawyers rather than elected leaders and the ballot box, as the primary means of effecting their social agenda on everything from gay marriage to assisted suicide to the use of vouchers for private-school education.
This overweening addiction to the courtroom as the place to debate social policy is bad for the country and bad for the judiciary. In the legislative arena, especially when the country is closely divided, compromises tend to be the rule the day. But when judges rule this or that policy unconstitutional, there’s little room for compromise: One side must win, the other must lose.
In constitutional litigation, too, experiments and pilot programs–real-world laboratories in which ideas can be assessed on the results they produce–are not possible. Ideas are tested only in the abstract world of legal briefs and lawyers arguments. As a society, we lose the benefit of the give-and-take of the political process and the flexibility of social experimentation that only the elected branches can provide.
At the same time, the politicization of the judiciary undermines the only real asset it has–its independence. Judges come to be seen as politicians and their confirmations become just another avenue of political warfare. Respect for the role of judges and the legitimacy of the judiciary branch as a whole diminishes.
The judiciary’s diminishing claim to neutrality and independence is exemplified by a recent, historic shift in the Senate’s confirmation process. Where trial-court and appeals-court nominees were once routinely confirmed on voice vote, they are now routinely subjected to ideological litmus tests, filibusters, and vicious interest-group attacks. It is a warning sign that our judiciary is losing its legitimacy when trial and circuit-court judges are viewed and treated as little more than politicians with robes.
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Dear Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch,
In regards to the commentary in your essay above, I have a couple of my own comments:
Gorsuch: "
American liberals have become addicted to the courtroom, relying on judges and lawyers rather than elected leaders and the ballot box, as the primary means of effecting their social agenda on everything from gay marriage to assisted suicide to the use of vouchers for private-school education.
"
Blake: You do know that the Supreme Court members, and not "American liberals," are the determiners of whether or not cases will be heard by the court?
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Gorsuch: "This overweening addiction to the courtroom as the place to debate social policy is bad for the country and bad for the judiciary..."
Blake- This sentence, followed by the whole remainder of your writing, indicates what I would call a complete lack of acknowledgement of the REALITY that those laws dealing with social policy, like laws regarding any and all other issues,
very often require the NEED FOR INTERPRETATION which is the REASON for the existence of the very institution of ADJUDICATION you have chosen to serve your career in!!!!!!!!!!!
In writing that "the politicization of the judiciary undermines the only real asset it has
–its independence...," you are essentially stating that a court's ability to make independent decisions based exclusively on the country's laws is undermined when there are vast numbers of stakeholders on opposing sides of interest regarding a court's applicable interpretation of law.
Well, WELCOME TO FUCK'N REALITY in which people are entitled to have judgments about the fuck'n judgments a judge makes! AS A JUDGE, you need only CONCERN YOURSELF WITH interpreting the law as it applies to a given case AND NOT WITH what the opinions are of anyone supporting either of the opposing sides in a case!!!!!!!!
