My LA Times Debate with Erwin Chemerinsky, Part 3:
The third and final part of my Los Angeles Times debate with UC Irvine Law School Dean Erwin Chemerinsky is now available here.
In this installment, we considered the question of whether "Obama's runaway victory last November give him a strong mandate to structure the Supreme Court as he likes." Since we actually don't disagree that much over the "mandate" issue, I used part of my allotted space to try to sum up the key points of dispute from our earlier exchanges over Sotomayor and judicial empathy.
I am grateful to the Times for organizing this discussion and to Dean Chemerinsky for his insightful contributions to it.
The entire series of posts is available here.
All Related Posts (on one page) | Some Related Posts:
- Supreme Court to Hear Oral Argument in Alvarez v. Smith - A Key Property Rights Case:
- Eduardo Penalver's Defense of Sotomayor's Didden decision:
- What the Didden Case Tells Us About Sotomayor's Attitude Towards Property Rights:...
- Another Critic of Judge Sotomayor's "Wise Latina" Sentence:
- My LA Times Debate with Erwin Chemerinsky, Part 3:
- Sotomayor May be Wrong About Race, but She is No Racist:...
- The Sotomayor Pick:
- Obama Chooses Sonia Sotomayor.
- Supreme Court to Hear Potentially Important Property Rights Case:
The Constitution if it stands for anything, it stands for the minority rights. And 48% is a pretty big minority. And yes, even the winner of an election is bound by the Constitution.
So NO he does not get a free pass at anything. Especially turning America into a two bit tin horn dictatorship, which seems to be his goal.
Decent topics for a debate, as you could argue them endlessly.
As a parting note: When a politician wins an office, shouldn't they do what they want to do (within the legally proscribed bounds of the office's responsibilities)? Should a politician really do their job differently if they get elected 75%-25% v. 60%-40% v. 51%-49%? Seems kinda silly. They won. They should do their job.
If there be one principle clearer than another, it is this: that in any business, whether of government or of mere merchandising, somebody must be trusted, in order that when things go wrong it may be quite plain who should be punished. In order to drive trade at the speed and with the success you desire, you must confide without suspicion in your chief clerk, giving him the power to ruin you, because you thereby furnish him with a motive for serving you. (Wilson, Congressional Government)
And now that another Progressive is in the White House, we don't need to be so suspicious about the Decider-in-Chief.
Deference be damned.
Crunchy Frog has it right. Congress, and in particular the Republicans of Congress, owe the President no deference whatsoever on this nomination.
What? Like Reagan in 84, Nixon in 72, Johnson in 64?
When did that happen?
With respect to your now closed
If one goes directly to the Taylor piece you link to, all he does in that one is castigate various persons for calling Sotomayer a racist.
If one clicks through several of Taylor's own links, you get to his column in which he says any white judge who said a corresponding thing would be properly banned from polite society as a racist:
Taylor then spends the rest of the column trying to explain why the Latina is not racist as compared to the white guy who is.
You say:
Taylor does think so-it is racist, except, I guess, in her case because Latinas can't be racist since they aren't white, or because they don't appear in polite society.
Taylor normally does a good job, but not this time. He is internally inconsistent.
Not that it matters, is your position actually that her position is wrong but isn't racist, or, is your position Taylor's, that it would be racist for a white male but isn't for a Latina?
Moreover, though, calling this a 52-48 election (or 53-47) ignores the very important Democratic victories/majorities in Congress. In the context of approval of Court nominees, obviously, the significant fact is that the Senate is now 60-40, OK, Franken needs to be seated and Spector is a Dem. through switching, but still, the Dems dominated the Congressional elections. The Dems can legitimately argue a mandate from that as well.
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