The rumors on the Internets are true!
From The LA Times today:
"It was a poignant moment, a very special gourmet, filet mignon dinner," said the Rev. Louis P. Sheldon, chairman of the Traditional Values Coalition, a prominent conservative advocacy group based in Washington. "Everyone knows the Dred Scott decision and you don't have to stretch your mind at all. When he said that, it made it very clear that the '73 decision was faulty because what it said was that unborn persons in a legal sense have no civil rights."
Sheldon, who said he confers frequently with Bush and his senior campaign advisors on outreach to religious conservatives, though not in this instance, credited the use of Dred Scott with raising the abortion issue to "a very high level" and "back to the front burner."
"It didn't just slip out by accident," Sheldon said.
Bizarrely, there are some people out there who still think this wasn't an intentional reference to Roe v. Wade. They can't make the connection themselves, so they assume that NOBODY would make the connection.
Bush sent two clear signals last Friday. The first one went to the media and the moderates of America:
I would pick somebody who would not allow their personal opinion to get in the way of the law. I would pick somebody who would strictly interpret the Constitution of the United States. [...]
And I suspect one of us will have a pick at the end of next year -- the next four years. And that's the kind of judge I'm going to put on there. No litmus test except for how they interpret the Constitution.
The message you are supposed to get from this is "no litmus test" -- personal opinions like "abortion is murder" won't be the basis for Bush's appointments. (Remember: moderate America does deem one's stance on abortion a personal opinion.)
And the second one -- the cloaked message -- went to people like Mr. Sheldon:
Another example would be the Dred Scott case, which is where judges, years ago, said that the Constitution allowed slavery because of personal property rights.
That's a personal opinion. That's not what the Constitution says. The Constitution of the United States says we're all -- you know, it doesn't say that. It doesn't speak to the equality of America.
And so, I would pick people that would be strict constructionists. We've got plenty of lawmakers in Washington, D.C. Legislators make law; judges interpret the Constitution.
Mr. Sheldon's side got the message loud and clear.
