Monday, July 11, 2005

Today's last post on the Supreme Court. (Dedicated to Naphtuli and his fellow travelers)

Ok, let me disabuse you: Neither conservative nor liberal justices care about truth, or principles, or any of that high-sounding jive.

Under the best circumstances, a meticulous justice cares about one thing: Doing what they think is best for the country, per any number of criteria that you choose to acknowledge.

That's what liberal justices do. And it's what conservative justices do.

And the founders knew it would go like this, and set up a system that permitted it. The idea that justices must "restrain" themselves is absurd and childlike. Anyone who's read the Federalist papers knows that Madison and Hamilton didn't expect any adult to "restrain" himself. (Men are bad. They are acquisitive and power hungry. Everyone but the simplest child knows this.)

The expected each branch of government to do whatever it could to acquire power for itself. That's why we have checks and balances. (Relying on the good will or the “principles” of the justice isn't much of a check or balance, which is why it's preposterous to suggest that this is what the Founders were counting on.)

The ultimate check is impeachment. And that's what you're supposed to do when a justice, in your view, gets it wrong. Impeach him.

If you can't muster an impeachment movement that's okay too, because your failure to impeach means the court has popular support. And if the court has popular support, be a good small “d” democrat and shut up.