Posted on 05/19/2022 7:02:50 AM PDT by Kaslin
Amidst the general wailing and gnashing of teeth over a Supreme Court ruling expected to overturn Roe v. Wade, one attack stands out as especially hypocritical. That is the contention that the Court is illegitimate because the presidential election process is insufficiently democratic.
A columnist for the Los Angeles Times claims “the reversal of Roe further undermines majoritarian rule and feeds the image of the justices as nothing more than partisans in black robes.” In a piece labeled “the real culprit,” The New Republic lectures its readers to “Blame the Electoral College.”
Yet, what the Court is poised to do is restore democratic control. When the original Constitution, as well as the Fourteenth Amendment, was written and ratified, abortion was left to the states. No one at that time believed the laws they wrote, debated, and voted on required states to allow any abortions, let alone all abortions and some instances of infanticide after birth.
Those lawmakers faithfully represented their constituents. It’s worth noting that those who considered such issues understood themselves as part of a long story of progress in the treatment of children. Ancient Israel had banned human sacrifice, contrary to many of their surrounding tribes. Pagan Greece and Rome had allowed the killing of babies, often by “exposing” them to natural elements and wild animals, as well as by abortion, but Christians worked to end these and other abuses of the young and vulnerable.
Banning human sacrifice, abortion, and other forms of abuse or killing of vulnerable people was a hallmark of civilization. Thus, the Americans who wrote the Constitution and the 14th Amendment, like many today, viewed abortion and euthanasia not as progress, but as regress to barbarism. Like it or not, that is the democratic reality behind the constitutional provisions at issue.
Of course, those who wrote the Constitution allowed for it to be amended. This has happened 27 times on issues ranging from civil rights to presidential elections and succession. Amending is a democratic process, controlled by the people’s elected representatives in state legislatures and Congress (and potentially on the people themselves in ratification conventions).
Yet, those who favor unlimited abortion, and sometimes infanticide after birth, are totally uninterested in this democratic process. When was the last time you heard a pro-abortion activist talk about amending the Constitution? Instead, they are fixated on the Supreme Court.
They want five judges to nullify the democratic actions of previous generations. And they want five judges to preclude any democratic lawmaking activity on these issues within the states today. They implicitly recognize that when this issue is left to democracy, they lose (according to their own goals, which polls consistently show are far outside mainstream American public opinion)
And yet pro-abortion activists lambaste the Court and the Electoral College? The point of an independent judiciary is that it is supposed to limit itself to saying what the law—passed by the people’s representatives—means, rather than making it up as they go along. And the Electoral College is, in fact, a two-step democratic process. Many countries use similar multi-stage elections (like parliamentary systems) at the national level to limit regionalism and force greater compromise and collation building.
On the Left, “democracy” seems to mean nothing more than “getting whatever we want.” This is more than obnoxious, it’s dangerous, since the concept is intertwined with constitutional government. If the Left convinces Americans that democracy is just another partisan tool of control rather than a process to create representation and accountability, they undermine faith in the very structures that make government by consent possible. This is the real war on democracy going on today in America.
Exactly.
The Left cares nothing for due process, the rule of law, or democratic process.
What they want is the rule by them for them.
Liberals love the courts, when the courts issue opinions which give them policies they like.
But when courts issue opinions which don’t deliver policies to their liking, then all of a sudden, the courts are a threat, and the process by which judges are selected to the courts is somehow illegitimate.
When Democrats win elections, then elections are free and fair. And we are told elections have consequences. When Republicans win elections, we are told that elections are somehow illegitimate and that the Electoral College needs to be abolished.
I’ve heard some leftist talking heads on TV recently, talk of how the electoral college gives disproportionate influence to small states, and how unfair that is, etc.
Someone in that discussion even suggested we do away with the states, and just have all laws and regulations come out of Washington, with no regard for state legislatures.
There’s that mindset that everything should be decided in Washington, DC.
As usual, liberals have it exactly backwards.
The Communist Party was not able to steal one Presidential election so it is undemocratic.
How did we manage to raise a generation this stupid
I see it here too- any time I see a wise-a$$ or snarky comment I always look to see their FR join date and more often than not it’s in the later 2000’s (a millennial)
They are just not filled with the smartitude I are.
And you can tell mostly by their brilliant c
How did we manage to raise a generation this stupid
I see it here too- any time I see a wise-a$$ or snarky comment I always look to see their FR join date and more often than not it’s in the later 2000’s (a millennial)
They are just not filled with the smartitude I are.
And you can tell mostly by their brilliant commentary like:
“ROTFLMAO TROLL!! ha ha putin-puffer” *giggle* *fart*
insufficiently democratic.
1 It’s a republic
2 Democracy is two wolves and a sheep deciding on dinner.
I've used that quote many times when trying to explain "democracy". And that is the exact reason the FF's created a Republic and the Electoral College. They knew that majority rule is mob rule.
Some of us were just late getting here, I had to lurk from 1999 until 2011 because my lurking was on my work computer, against the rules at work to sign on to outside web site.
Could look and read but couldn’t sign up.
Didn’t get my own home computer until 2011, sign up as soon as my son had me functional.
Some of us old farts were just late to the party.
A columnist for the Los Angeles Times claims “the reversal of Roe further undermines majoritarian rule and feeds the image of the justices as nothing more than partisans in black robes.” In a piece labeled “the real culprit,” The New Republic lectures its readers to “Blame the Electoral College.”Heh, LA Slimes & the Commie Republic:
MADISON ON MAJORITY RULE
Madison’s justly famous 10th Federalist Paper offers a brilliant practical solution to controlling government. He begins with a tough‐minded analysis of the dangers of faction in a republic. People tend, he says, to divide themselves into groups or factions on the basis of wealth, occupation, or religious commitment and seek to dominate others. Protecting against factional domination thus became a central problem for a government founded on majority rule.
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