SCOTUS, The Fickle Friend of the People
Dred Scott. Plessy. Buck. Kore-fuckin’-matsu .
Over and over again, the American Experiment — for Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness — has crashed up against SCOTUS.
What’s important to the current debate, is that until the Warren and Burger Courts of our lifetimes, it was rare for the Supreme Court of the United States to open up new freedoms of marginalized groups, or defend them legally. SCOTUS has generally acted as a “Super-Senate,” trying to “cool off” the passions of the masses in favor of the status quo.
And in that, it almost always turned a blind eye to discrimination.
But when the rare became common, in living memory, we took it to mean that’s how things would always be.
Worse: we didn’t teach that SCOTUS defending rights was rare, historically. We didn’t teach that, in American history, we generally had to lean on legislation, not jurisprudence, to get Justice done.
The Conservative Movement, didn’t forget. Turning it back started in the Rehnquist Court, of course…and will continue with this Court, ready to start hearing cases Monday.
The difference can be you, though. Rulings like Scott happened in spaces where no one of import pushed back. No one in power really gave a damn about people like me.
Now, though, people like me have been POTUS. We came so damn close to our 1st Woman POTUS. Both Progressives, if (as always) “not Progressive enough”.
And today, we Progressives have an outside shot to control not just part of the Federal, but to break open the critical local/state roles we need to avoid another wipe-out, as happened post-Reconstruction.
History says we are at a crucial point. We must seize this moment. We must ensure our voices are at every level of American lawmaking, and stay there. We cannot afford the thinking, any longer, that POTUS or SCOTUS will protect the gains we have made, that local laws and organizing do not matter.
If we do not strike now, the Conservative movement will consolidate the pain. They are eager to inflict more voting restrictions, voting IDs and voting roll purges, with legislatures happy to pass those laws, and a SCOTUS willing to allow — as long as the “right people” are empowered by the result.
We — and I mean all of use — are not those “right people,” if you’re reading this.
But we must be the right people, for this American Experiment to not just survive, but thrive.