by Surely it is not a coincidence that Justice Stevens announced his retirement after 34 years on the Supreme Court just one hour after Bart Stupak announced his retirement from the House of Representatives after 18 years of service there.
Stupak fits many of President Obama’s stated criteria for a Supreme Court justice. Stupak has never served as a judge, and instead possesses extensive experience as a legislator. Stupak spent ten years as a Michigan State Police trooper until he was injured in the line of duty, and then he practiced law and served in the state legislature. Stupak would prevent the Court from being filled with Ivy League graduates, having gone to Thomas Cooley Law School in Michigan. (Admittedly, Cooley is quite a drop from the Ivy League, but a similar gap has not dissuaded Vice President Biden from employing his Syracuse law education to influence the Court first as chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee and now in guiding the Administration’s nomination process). Stupak’s congressional biography champions his work in environmental protection, ethics enforcement, and regulating drug companies (with the latter role being especially poignant given the role that an acne drug may have played in Stupak’s son’s suicide).
But Stupak is best known as a pro-life Democrat. His website boasts that Stupak “has steadfastly championed pro-life values from the moment of conception until an individual’s last breath” –http://www.house.gov/stupak/about_bart.shtml. He can fairly be said to be the median legislator in the House, placed in the ideological middle of his colleagues, for the new health reform law would not have passed without his vote. On other issues, Stupak’s record is more in line with his Democratic colleagues in Congress.
Stupak thus presents President Obama with the opportunity to demonstrate what is more important to him: championing the ordinary person or defending abortion rights. None of the presumed leading candidates for the Court possess anything like Stupak’s compelling biography and actual connection to the people as a police officer and as a legislator. A Stupak appointment would affirm those pro-life individuals who have put their faith in President Obama. But the President would send the opposite message by dismissing Stupak or any other pro-life candidates. If Justice
Stevens is replaced by a justice who questions the Court’s abortion jurisprudence, then legislators can begin to fashion a range of responses to abortion that are acceptable to their constituents. Justice Stupak would be a transformative choice. We’ll see if President Obama makes it.
Well, that’s a different point of view. My own view is that Stupak is the most disgraceful (or disgraced?) figure in American politics in recent memory. In fact, I thought at first that John must be in irony mode. Evidently not everyone shares my view, but I suspect that enough people do to preclude any judicial nomination.
Kind of irony mode. Steve’s response suggests another lesson for Supreme Court appointments: it would be hard to appoint a member of Congress because they have to take positions on so many controversial issues. But let’s leave Stupak out of it and consider two other points. First, are pro-life Democrats pushing — expecting? — the President to appoint a Justice who is willing to challenge the Court’s abortion jurisprudence? If, instead, the President appoints someone who wants to extend that jurisprudence (as Justice Stevens wanted to do), how will pro-life Democrats respond? Second, should someone with Stupak’s biography — former cop and state legislator who went to an undistinguished law school — be considered for the Supreme Court? Is that the kind of person whom the President has in mind when he emphasizes the need for someone who can relate to ordinary people? Or will he accept, say, someone who worked as a community organizer after attending elite institutions? I am not at all questioning the validity of the President’s experience, but I do question whether the combination of elite education followed by local work makes one more “like the people” than a cop who went to law school.
I like the thought process. I have read/seen a lot of the coverage of Stupak, and still don’t feel like I know much about him. Your brief article told me more than all the news reports, when tend toward the sensational. I guess you don’t have to worry about sponsors and selling papers! Very thought-provoking points about Obama’s upcoming appointment. I’m guessing it’s not going to be Stupak, so any other thoughts? Maybe a soon-to-be 50 year old Notre Dame law professor?