Former SCOTUS Justice Fears Death of Democracy

Retired US Supreme Court justice, Anthony Kennedy, fears “democracy is not guaranteed to survive, and that “partisanship is becoming much more prevalent and more bitter.” If that’s his honest opinion, then thank you for retiring. Why? America has never been a democracy, and a Supreme Court justice should know this.

The US is, and always has been, a democratic republic – same as Congo, Vietnam, and… North Korea. We elect our leaders with the expectations that they will rule as we wish them to rule. If they don’t, there’s always the next election. Had former justice Kennedy spoke correctly, he would have stated, “[our] republic is not guaranteed to survive.”

He should know that in a true democracy the people rule at all times – and a Supreme Court would be irrelevant. Hence, until US citizens are permitted to vote on every bill/proposal, rather than just our leaders voting on them, we are NOT a democracy.

As for his partisanship comment, he stated, “We live in an era where reasoned, thoughtful, rational, respectful discourse has been replaced by antagonistic, confrontational conversation.” Quite honestly, I have little opposition to that.

Reasoned, thoughtful, and rational usually means compromise. Decades of compromise has lessened self-responsibility while increasing dependence on the success of others via theft (i.e., taxation). Compromising self-reliance and collectivism takes us further away from independence and closer to insanity. Governments need to be one or the other, not both. The wider the gap between the two, the more likely there will be civil unrest.

Sad to say, that unrest has also crept into everyday life; into things in which politics should never play a role. Remember the Bud Light transgender ordeal? If you’re a true Bud Light drinker, why would you give it up because Anheiser-Busch may support someone who, in all likelihood, will never affect your life? If Target is where you like to shop, why would you boycott them because they want to hire based on merit instead of DEI decisions? Boycotts usually harm store employees simply trying to provide for family, not the corporate executives one disagrees with. It’s silly!

Has the Supreme Court become more politicized, or has it always been that way? Let’s go back to the Constitutional Amendment that allowed for income taxes. Previous Supreme Court decisions had declared income taxes as unconstitutional. However, a little sway from President Wilson and the ambiguous “ratified” vs. “declared ratified”… Let’s just say politics is politics and it always has been.

My point is this: The Supreme Court is made up of nine persons. Nine persons with opinions, beliefs, and varying interpretations of what our founding fathers, and their successors, intended. They are not perfect. The Court will always be altered based on the latest president who made the latest nominations. We can only hope they interpret the Constitution in the best interests of freedom, human rights, and consistency as much as humanely possible… and they will never please everyone all the time.

Source used: the Guardian