WASHINGTON — With just weeks to go before the Iowa Caucus, Newt Gingrich has turned his presidential campaign into a veritable megaphone warning about the dangers and elitism of America’s judicial system. The former House Speaker held a half-hour phone call on Saturday during which he pledged to abolish courts and eliminated activist judges he believed were either outside the mainstream or infringing too deeply on the commander in chief’s authority. On Sunday, he followed that up by saying he would be willing to arrest a judge who he thought was out of line.
It’s a propaganda point as predictable as it is tired and offensive: Conservatives complaining about “activist” judges. It’s really just code for judges who happen to rule based on the law instead of ideology. When a “Liberal” judge does it, it’s the worst sort of judicial activism and egregious legislating from the bench imaginable. When a “Conservative” judge does it, it’s measured, thoughtful, and completely appropriate jurisprudence.
I suppose the good news is that Newt Gingrich has revealed himself to be what most of us on the Left have known him to be all along: an anti-democratic despot who values the democratic process only insofar as it can be manipulated for his own self-aggrandizement. That a man who claims to be an historian who loves America could seriously put forward the idea that as President he would act in direct contravention of the rule of law is stunning. That Gingrich would hold himself up as the sole authority and arbiter of what would pass as “acceptable” jurisprudence is both offensive and contrary to the separation of powers.
The arrogance and distaste for the judiciary displayed by Gingrich only serves to show how unfit he is to serve as President. A Gingrich Presidency would be a disaster, if for no other reason than he’s publicly stated that he would not hesitate to undermine the judiciary if he disagreed with a judge’s ruling. This exchange between Gingrich and Bob Schieffer is chilling:
SCHIEFFER: One of the things you say is that if you don’t like what a court has done, that Congress should subpoena the judge and bring him before Congress and hold a Congressional hearing… how would you enforce that? Would you send the Capitol Police down to arrest him?
GINGRICH: Sure. If you had to. Or you’d instruct the Justice Department to send a U.S. Marshal.
Though Gingrich is attempting to tap dance around his intentions, it seems clear that he’s reserving the right to arrest or otherwise harass judges whose rulings he happens to find distasteful or ideologically unsound. In essence, he’s advocating for the creation of a banana republic in which the executive branch retains the right to overturn legal rulings it happens to disapprove of for ideological or really ANY reason. The effect on the impartiality of the rule of law would be chilling: judges may well finding themselves having to consider the political implications of their rulings…as well as the personal risks they might be assuming.
It appears that, at least to Gingrich’s way of thinking, undermining more than 200 years of precedent wouldn’t present a problem, because he’s just arrogant enough to believe that he knows best.
The question, of course, is how to define “imposing secularism.” Are we to trust that Gingrich will assume that responsibility for himself? And what of the separation of Church and State? Or does that only apply when it’s ideologically and politically convenient for Conservatives like Gingrich?
And what, really, is so wrong with secularism? How does interpreting law based on the law itself pass as offensive to those bent on creating a theocracy run by the equivalent of the American Taliban? Surely I’m not the only person convinced that Gingrich cares for Christianity only insofar as it furthers his interests and lust for power?
Gingrich thinks he’s the best candidate the Republicans have, but he doesn’t even respect the Constitution that a President must take an oath to uphold. (Perhaps he’d be leading the crusade to impeach himself??) Or is he really, truly arrogant enough to believe that he knows best?
As if the answer to that question isn’t painfully obvious….
