American Revolution 2.0 - Supreme Court Nominees

We launched the “American Revolution 2.0” series of essays out of continuing frustration with the Political Class being so wildly out of touch with the heart and soul of America. We wrote in the first essay about the misread of the tea parties, and about the tone-deafness of the White House-authorized Air Force One fly-by of Manhattan, here. We expect an endless supply of new topics so long as this out-of-touch condition remains. We were handed another such topic after listening to Political Class/Pravda commentary on the likely Obama appointee to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice David Souter.

Virtually all commentary so far is about nominees who ‘check all the right boxes’—which in the Political Class/Pravda world means the fulfillment of all politically correct group identity features. The nominee must be a woman (√), Hispanic (√), lesbian (√), single mother (√), illegal immigrant (√), Islamo-fascist (√) [okay, the last two were probably a joke], etc., etc., all for the purpose of assuring that the Supreme Court reflects ‘the wonderful multi-cultural mosaic that is the American people’ or some other flowery psycho-babble description of Americans.

We’ve linked often to Peter Ferrara’s classic essay "What is an American?", written soon after 9/11 in response to a Pakistani militant encouraging Muslims everywhere to kill Americans. Mr. Ferrara pointed out that Americans are not identified by gender or race or ethnicity or religion—they are identified by their love of freedom.

To us, the spirit of Mr. Ferrara’s essay is of a piece with the spirit of America’s founding, and in particular with the Declaration of Independence: the self-evident truth that all men are created equal, and endowed by their Creator with inalienable rights, including life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. The love of freedom is hardwired into us, and the Declaration of Independence gave it voice in one of history’s most powerful settings.

We all know that America has had to grow into the right and righteous spirit of the Declaration. That spirit could not be reconciled with the institution of slavery, nor with the treatment of women as a non-voting, second class of citizen. But the fault was not in the Declaration of Independence; it was in our understanding and, if you will, demonstration of what it means. But Americans HAVE grown into the right and righteous spirit of it—and at considerable cost, especially in the Civil War.

The debate over Supreme Court nominees presents once again the opportunity to rise in the understanding and demonstration of American ideals. It is an absolute disgrace, and an offense to the spirit of the Declaration of Independence, to rate any nominee higher or lower because of their gender, race, ethnicity or even tax bracket. Here are the qualifications and values to look for:

• Willingness to uphold, preserve and defend the Constitution of the United States of America as it is written;

• A life that bespeaks love of individual freedom and personal responsibility;

• Consistent refusal to lie, cheat or steal; proven record of rebuking lying, cheating and stealing, regardless of who is doing it—boss or subordinate; family member or non-family member; senior in age or junior; male or female; skin color the same or not the same; church member or non-church member;

• Proven record of treating any and all others as individuals and with dignity and respect—at least until their actual conduct deserves otherwise;

• Proven willingness to work hard and a record of working well; proven record of pushing any and all others work hard and work well;

• Proven record of taking or supporting action to assure that any and all law-abiding citizens and others experience personal safety and security;

• Record of personal commitment to, and valuing of the institution of the family

Find an individual with an “A” rating on these qualifications—and make no mistake, they exist in every size, shape, color and form, all over this country—and you’ll have a great nominee. It won’t matter whether the nominee is a man or a woman; it won’t matter what the nominee’s skin color is; it won’t matter where the nominee’s parents were born; it won’t matter whether the nominee is rich, poor or in between. Flip it around, and find a nominee with less than an “A” rating on these qualifications, and even if the nominee meets all PC qualifications in terms of the mere ‘fleshly’ factors of gender, skin color, family origin, etc., the nominee will be a poor judge. Flip it around again, and take the view that certain people cannot or need not fulfill these qualifications because of their gender, race or family background, and the spirit of the Declaration of Independence will have been grossly violated once again.

This will be the real ‘story behind the story’ as the coverage of Obama’s Supreme Court nominee proceeds in the weeks and months ahead. If the nominee is controversial, and we have no doubt he or she will be, the Political Class and Pravda will elevate all PC qualifications as trumping everything else, and will dismiss all objections as racist or bigoted in some form. But the truth of any controversy will likely derive from the fact that the nominee does not radiate A-level qualifications of the kind we’ve described. The more legitimate the controversy, and the greater the real distance below A-level qualifications the nominee appears to be, the more the brushfires of the second American Revolution will be stirred and stoked, and the tea partiers will find yet another element of this government that must be reversed.

Paul Gable

Posted May 1, 2009