I have obligations. I have duties to complete before the end of the month and beyond. And yet I find myself incapable of doing any of it. The Trumpian news cycle, and the ever-escalating horror of each successive news event, causes me to curl into a ball of anxiety from which no useful work emanates. Last week, it was the kidnapping and imprisonment of refugee children by the administration. Now, after the release of a series of awful Supreme Court decisions, Justice Anthony Kennedy has announced his retirement.
Trump continues to assert his authoritarianism in leaps and bounds. The conservative wing of the Supreme Court has no doubt made him happy by becoming his lap dog, having approved Trump’s desired ban of Muslim refugees, approved racial gerrymanders, approved non-disclosure of “crisis pregnancy” facilities’ lack of licensure, and ended required “fair share” payments from non-union members to public-erector unions. Meanwhile, due process and other civil liberties are eroded. I am wondering if democracy can survive until November.
As a gay man, I view Kennedy’s departure from the Court with particular trepidation. Since the retirement of Sandra Day O’Connor, Kennedy had served as the fulcrum of the court, though a much more rightward fulcrum than O’Connor in her day. Kennedy did a lot of damage in that role: as a particularly ugly example, he participated in the degradation of the Voting Rights Act in 2013. Nonetheless, Kennedy was the author of the four Supreme Court decisions that successively granted greater rights to LGBTQ people. A review of those decisions is useful to comprehend just how far the LGBTQ rights movement has come in a period of 19 years. First, in 1996, there was Romer v. Evans, where the Court struck down a Colorado law prohibiting municipalities from enacting and enforcing laws in their communities prohibiting discrimination against LGBTQ people. Then, in 2003, cam Lawrence v. Texas, which struck down sodomy laws in all states. In 2013 came the United States v.Windsor decision, which compelled the U. S. government to provide same-sex couples legally married (in the the states that permitted such marriages at that time) the benefits that it provides to opposite-sex married couples. (It was after that decision that hubby and I decided to marry.) Finally, there was Obergefell v. Hodges in 2015, which guaranteed the right of marriage to same-sex couples in all of the United States. From being illegal to being able to marry in just under two decades. In each of these cases, Kennedy was the deciding vote as well as the author of the decision.
With Kennedy’s departure, all of this progress is vulnerable. Trump is sure to nominate someone far more conservative than Kennedy was, and we can presume such a Justice would vote to overturn some or all of the decisions listed above. And that’s not all, of course. Abortion rights are also highly vulnerable, as well as other civil rights, labor rights, and the ACA. How long will it be before such a court will start to allow the erosion of basic constitutional rights? Due process? Freedom of speech? Freedom of assembly? Habeas corpus?
The Republicans hold all the levers of power, and they’re determined to give Trump what he wants. Our only hopes appear to be relying on Democrats in the Senate to use procedural strategies to bring the confirmation process to a grinding halt—or delay until after the new Congress begins its session; and persuading “moderate” pro-choice Republican Senators Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski to vote against any anti-choice nominee. Good luck with that! Democrats are famous for losing their resolve, and even the most agreeable “moderate” Republican voted in lockstep with the rest of her party. Eric Lesh tweeted “That’s the ballgame. We will never win another civil rights victory in my lifetime.” Mine either.
We can continue to contact our lawmakers. We can continue to protest publicly. And I will do this. This coming Saturday, Erie, PA, has its annual Price March and Rally, and I will be there carrying the ACLU banner. Then in the evening, there will be a candlelight vigil to Keep Families Together at Congressman Mike Kelly’s (PA-03, R, worse than useless) Sharon, PA, office.
But I keep feeling that all this activity is still not enough. We’re in a race against time to save democracy, and it feels like we’re losing.
I have written before that I have confidence that democracy in the U. S. can be restored, eventually, but the question is how long and torturous will our current detour in the land of autocracy last? Kennedy’s retirement makes a years-long detour much too likely. With that in mind, John Lewis’ tweet today, seen elsewhere on this site, allows for some perspective:
The centuries-long struggle for African-Americans to obtain real equal rights in this country, still ongoing, is a model that might make our current crisis look like a relatively small bump in the road. However, we’re all going to suffer the consequences, possibly for decades. Further, the autocratic tendencies of the orange disgrace present despotic possibilities never before seen in this country.
I’m just saying, I know where my passport is.
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