by BAR editor and senior columnist Margaret Kimberley
When every other argument fails, those who urge Blacks and progressives to stick with the Democratic Party finally pull out their clincher: We must vote Democratic to keep the Republicans from stacking the courts. Democrats are then free to nominate whomever they want, free of criticism from the Left. “Any mediocre nominee could be praised to the high heavens because after all, he or she is not as bad as Scalia or Thomas.”
Freedom Rider: Obama’s Supreme Court
by BAR editor and senior columnist Margaret Kimberley
“If Obama cannot be counted on to put a justice in place who will do at least as well as Stevens, then the supposed need to give unquestioning support to Democrats has been proven to be patently false.”
Every four years there is an election for president of the United States and every four years there is great disappointment regarding those candidates who are given sufficient political and economic support to be serious contenders. The Democratic Party eventually presents a presidential nominee who consciously and decisively ignores or subverts the progressive agenda, the needs of people of color and the needs of working people.
Every four years progressives at first complain about the nominee and then quickly conclude that they should instead be quiet and support a person who has no intention of supporting them and the rest of the party’s base. That candidate, who is lackluster at best and dangerous at worst, is then presented as the only means of opposing the Republicans who we are told must be kept out of office at all cost.
It matters not if the candidate becomes president and wages war more intently than Republicans, bails out the financial services and health insurance industries or does nothing to ease unemployment for a group who provided a 99% rate of support. Barack Obama has done all of these things, and none of it came as a surprise to anyone who closely followed his presidential campaign.
As the years have gone by, and the political system has become more and more firmly under the grip of corporate interests, those candidates have gotten worse and worse. As always, when there was any discussion of looking beyond the phony two-party choice, reaction was immediate and vociferous. A primary reason given for unquestioned support is the president’s authority to make federal judicial appointments.
“Do the Democrats have the wherewithal to challenge their party and force it to meet their demands?”
Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens, a Republican appointee, recently announced his retirement, giving Barack Obama the opportunity to make his second Supreme Court nomination. This moment will prove once and for all whether or not Democratic presidential choices must be supported without question. It will also prove whether or not most Democrats have the wherewithal to challenge their party and force it to meet their demands.
Of course the Republicans will push back against a Democratic president’s choice. That is to be expected. It is not a reason to begin by caving into demands from the White House to give the president a free hand to make his choice without opposition from the rank and file.
Despite having been appointed by Republican Gerald Ford, Stevens became one of the court’s more liberal members. The loss of a Republican who tended to vote like a Democrat is a tremendous one and will be worsened if a Democratic president chooses not to replace him with a justice who will actively pursue an agenda of protecting our legal rights against discrimination and the powers of the state and corporations. Stevens dissented against the majority in two very important recent discrimination cases.He was on the right and righteous side as a dissenter in the New Haven firefighter case in which white fire fighters successfully claimed to be victims of “reverse” discrimination. He also dissented in the case of Lily Ledbetter versus Goodyear. In that case the majority voted in favor of wage discrimination and against remedies to prove its existence. Only congressional action undid that grave injustice.
“Stevens dissented against the majority in two very important recent discrimination cases.”
We are told to ignore endless war, corporate bailouts, and disregard for the needs of the unemployed because of the importance of the federal judiciary. If Obama cannot be counted on to put a justice in place who will do at least as well as Stevens, then the supposed need to give unquestioning support to Democrats has been proven to be patently false.
Obama would not appoint a conservative of the ilk of Antonin Scalia or Clarence Thomas. Yet using that two-headed monster as a standard gives new meaning to the expression “damning with faint praise.” Any mediocre nominee could be praised to the high heavens because after all, he or she is not as bad as Scalia or Thomas.
The actions that progressives take during the nomination and confirmation process will make or break us as a movement. If Democrats in the Senate are allowed to put the fear of Republican filibusters in our hearts, then we will be subjected to one awful nominee and one awful bail out after another.
Those of us who dare to look outside of the Democrat/Republican box already have the courage of our convictions to defend ourselves. We have reasoned analysis and criticism on our side. We will be fully vindicated if the next Supreme Court justice doesn’t pass muster with those convictions and fails the litmus tests that we rightly hold dear.
The case for ditching the Democratic Party is already easy to make already. If Obama doesn’t make the right choice for the court, he will have made our case for us.
Margaret Kimberley's Freedom Rider column appears weekly in BAR. Ms. Kimberley lives in New York City, and can be reached via e-Mail at Margaret.Kimberley(at)BlackAgandaReport.com.
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