Last week, Chief Justice John Roberts lamented that there's "no basis" for those who are complaining about the legitimacy of Supreme Court justices. Americans have taken issue with the Supreme Court after Republicans spent nearly a year blocking the appointment of a justice after the death of the late Justice Antonin Scalia. It led to Trump being able to appoint three judges in a 4 year term and taking the court from being moderate to swinging to the far right.
Since then, the rulings have infuriated the majority of Americans who don't support the level of extremism coming from the court. It prompted the midwestern newspaper, the St. Louis Post Dispatch to issue an editorial calling out Roberts for being clueless that he's part of the problem.
The GOP's "Machiavellian stunt," as the paper called it, may have worked out if it hadn't been for their behavior since then.
"Though blessed with lifetime appointments that supposedly insulate justices from the muck of partisanship, the court’s majority has nonetheless hewed to the Republican political agenda as diligently as any freshman legislator on issues like gun restrictions, the environment and, most of all, abortion rights," the editorial said.
At the same time, there are questions about Justice Brett Kavanaugh's finances, lack of a full FBI background check and possible corruption over his appointment. Kavanaugh isn't alone, Justice Clarence Thomas is now facing complaints over his ethics for his wife's participation in the attempt to overthrow the 2020 election.
The Dobbs decision, which unmade a national right to medical privacy for women, didn't have to go that far, as Roberts himself pointed out.
"Yet the court’s five hard-core conservatives eagerly reached around that case to bigfoot into the broader culture-war fight over abortion," said the column. The liberal justices correctly noted that the only reason the right judges eliminated Roe protections was that they've always hated them.
"To revamp standing law for no reason except that one side suddenly has the votes is how legislatures operate," the editorial said. "It’s not how judges should. Judges are, or are supposed to be, bound by precedent until there is a compelling legal reason to break from it. Yet in this case, the only reason they did it was that they could."
They went on to say that they don't buy Roberts' "confusion" about why people hate the court. He made it clear that he is just as annoyed with the "Dobbs concurrence."
"Which begs the question of why he is lecturing America now about its lack of trust in the court instead of working to remind his fellow conservative justices that they are indeed justices, and not Republican members of Congress," the editorial closes.
Read the full column at the St. Louis Post Dispatch.
