Our traditional reverence for The Supreme Court of the United States (“SCOTUS”) had been virtually comparable to the nature and intensity of religious belief. As the third branch, specified in our constitutionally designed “Separation of Powers,” it was created to empirically perform the vitally important duty of the Nation’s legal oversight and guidance, review the appropriate constitutional function of the other two branches of Government, Executive, and Legislative, and, as necessary, clarify legal disputes, emanating from the lower Courts. The mission of America’s highest Court was to, objectively and impartially, assure justice through the protection of constitutional rights. We have analogized its vitally important function to the traditional lighthouse whose emanations of light served as a navigational guide to seafarers and a protection from the hazards of dangerous shoals, reefs, and ambient rocks. The essence of the analogy consists in the High Court’s responsible and undertaken function in the guidance of our Ship of State when necessary, to the desirable destination of just resolution of foundational legal issues.
As stated, we eternally revered the legal acumen and circumspection evinced by such referential supervision by SCOTUS, in its demonstrated motivation to reliably protect the legal rights of the Nation and its citizens. Justices such as Marshall. Holmes, Cardozo, Brennan, Brandeis, and Warren were among the many judicial recipients of our veneration and high esteem. We took special pleasure in reading the opinions of Justice Benjamin Cardozo with high praise for their aesthetic style as well as their expressions of deliberated wisdom.
To ensure the implementation of the constitutional architecture mandating the “Separation of Powers,” procedural rules were established regarding standard applications for the acceptance of cases for consideration by SCOTUS. Prerequisite proceedings, known as applications for a “Writ of Certiorari,” in which an appellant had the obligation to demonstrate the complete absence or, indeed, any indirect potential impact of the relevant issues on any political matter. Such “Black Letter Law,” predicate, in combination with the lifetime appointment accorded to the nine SCOTUS justices, was prudently established to avoid the possibility of the corrupting influence of politics in the determinations of this “Court of Last Resort.” As said by Thomas Paine, “We have no King, the Law is King.”
To the credit of SCOTUS, this constitutionally salubrious policy was strictly and unwaveringly adhered to until the eventful, unprecedented 2000 SCOTUS case of Bush v. Gore. The acceptance and consideration of the latter case, dealing with political issues, (regarding issues arising from a contested count of Presidential ballots) was inarguably, political and against mandatory case precedent. It was, nevertheless, accepted and decided by the High Court. In our view, this was the first indication of the abandonment of the Court’s traditional neutrality and its unprecedented transmogrification and descent into the inappropriate state of political and religiously, influenced behavior. (See early essay: “WHERE YOU AT, SCOTUS?”).
It is painfully disappointing to observe that from the latter case, decided in the year 2,000, to the present, the nation has been witness to the deep, regressive morphing of SCOTUS from its venerable status as an impartial and objective arbitrator of foundational legal issues and wise interpreter of the law, to its extant corrupt, politically and religiously influenced, condition. The High Court’s biased control by the Conservative majority of four, (tactically maintained by the perverse roadblocks of Senate Leader, Mitch McConnell) in tandem with the anti-democratic, Trump-influenced (“MAGA”) lobbies have proven to effectively and unashamedly eschew the traditionally responsible and impartial ethos of their historical predecessors, and render homage to the extant populist undemocratic, political and intrusive religious interests. The nation’s former guiding light has sadly, dimmed, if not been rendered opaque.
Accordingly, mainstream America has, of late, been obliged to endure, by errant decisional law, the unconstitutional catering to the atavistic religious lobby, for example, by inhumanely and unprecedentedly, overturning women’s long-established right of abortion, and corruptly acceding to Conservative political influencers, for example, by their denying of relief from unconstitutional gerrymandering, morally base affirmative action, gun regulation, and an entire cornucopia of needed liberal reforms. SCOTUS has improperly and purposefully, assisted Donald Trump in his war on American democracy by its unseemly, partisan-influenced assistance to his improper efforts to delay, and thereby, tactically defeat his well-deserved criminal prosecution for his 71 publically admitted criminal felonies, including treason, incitement of insurrection [ref. Art, 14 (3)], voter interference, and the illegal purloining of top secret documents.
Mainstream American citizens, in light of the empirically presenting facts, of necessity, must undertake the existentially vital responsibility to display the bright light of traditional democracy; and decree by its resounding vote, an effective “appellate” assurance of the continuance of our Democratic Republic, in consonance with the salutary provisions and intended spirit of the Constitution.
-p.
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