On yesterday’s program we discussed the turmoil our nation faces – Antifa violence in the streets, local officials enabling it, and federal judicial activists who block attempts to create law and order. This is a time when America needs sound, constitutional judges. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas has long been one of those constitutionalist judges, and the left would love nothing more than to get rid of him. Justice Thomas has long endured relentless attacks from the left— not because he’s corrupt or unethical, but because he refuses to bow to the left’s expectations. I’d like to take a moment to recognize an example of why Justice Thomas is so hated by the left and so needed on our Supreme Court.
During a recent Q&A session at Catholic University Law School, Thomas addressed the issue of “stare decisis” (or following previous decisions). He hit the nail on the head, and he did so in a way that was accessible to every American, easy to understand! This is particularly important as we work through a blockbuster Supreme Court term, and many old precedents are up for consideration.
Thomas explained, “It’s not some sort of automatic deal where you can just say, ‘stare decisis,’ and then turn off the brain.” He described this call to following previous decisions as a long train where decisions are new train cars hooked on to the long train, but Thomas says, “we never go to the front to see who’s driving the train or where it is going, and you could up there to the engine room and find out it’s an orangutan!”
In Thomas’s interview for the film “Created Equal” (about his life and legacy), he said: “With these notions like stare decisis, we say, that’s been decided, everybody fall in line. Well, then why are we here? Are we supposed to stop thinking?”
The truth is that Justice Clarence Thomas represents something the left can’t tolerate. He is an independent, successful black man who refuses to see himself as a victim of America, and he is a constitutional jurist who refuses to adopt the supposedly unquestionable precedent of earlier activist courts. That’s why they attack him and that’s why his voice is more needed than ever in our American judicial system.
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