Kagan For Supreme Court?

Barack Obama has nominated his Elena Kagan to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens. It is so easy to be apathetic or not informed on occurring issues. This is one that could have far reaching ramifications and worthy of your consideration.

You should be reminded that this is a lifetime appointment, so perhaps we should consider the implications for our Constitution and for liberty.

Will this Ivy League academic be an advocate for Essential Liberty and Rule of Law, or will she follow the errant notion of a "living constitution"? According to Obama, Kagan "is widely regarded as one of the nation's foremost legal minds," probably admitting that she is most certainly an elitist Leftist. Another academic lawyer from Princeton, Harvard and Chicago Law School and, from past experience, it is evident that we don't need any more of these.

Obama's appraisal of Kagan reflects that of ultra-Leftist Princeton prof Wilentz, under whose guidance Kagan wrote her enthusiastic thesis on socialism in the early 20th century. In her thesis, Kagan lamented that free enterprise overcame socialism and concluded, "A coherent socialist movement is nowhere to be found in the United States to speak of a golden past than of a golden future, of capitalism's glories than of socialism's greatness."

"Why . . . has a radical party never attained the status of a major political force?" she asked. "Why, in particular, did the socialist movement never become an alternative to the nation's established parties? Further, Kagan lamented the fact that free enterprise overcame socialism and concluded, "In our own times, a coherent socialist movement is nowhere to be found in the United States. Americans are more likely to speak of a golden past than of a golden future, of capitalism's glories than of socialism's greatness."

One would surmise this refers to the "hope and change" necessary for Obama to make good on his promise to "fundamentally transform the United States of America."

Just as Obama was mentored by Marxists, Kagan has been steeped in socialist doctrine, and is elated with the resurgence of socialism in the U.S. under the leadership of Obama and his minions in the legislative and judicial branches.

Although Obama insists that Kagan "is an acclaimed legal scholar with a rich understanding of constitutional law", in fact, she has exactly no judicial experience and very limited litigation experience. According to Legal authority Ken Klukowski, Kagan is an ideal nominee for Obama: "She's a liberal without a paper trail."

Most of Kagan's experience is academic at the University of Chicago Law School and as dean of Harvard Law School, where she spent considerable time and effort to boot military recruiters off campus at the height of the Iraq war. Her reason for this attack on our nation's ability to defend itself was the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy, which Kagan called "a profound wrong -- a moral injustice of the first order."

We should note that even The Washington Post concludes that her qualifications "can only be called thin," saying further, "even her professional background is thin."

While the media pictures Kagan, predictably, as a moderate "consensus-builder," Kagan is, in fact, a genuine, hardcore Leftist, a former legal counsel to the Clinton regime who began her political career as a staffer for extremely liberal Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis's presidential campaign in 1988.

She graduated from Princeton in 1981, when Ronald Reagan took office. A New York Times story about Kagan notes, "On Election Night, she drowned her sorrow in vodka and tonic as Ronald Reagan took the White House" which she proclaimed "the darkest period of American politics".

Recently, the questionable and thin legal trail she has established as Obama's Solicitor to the Supreme Court raises serious questions about Kagan's commitment to the plain language of the First Amendment. In a 1996 law review article, Kagan wrote that the "redistribution of speech" is not "itself an illegitimate end," which is another way of saying that the court has a responsibility to level the playing field for various ideas, including the Internet, talk radio, etc She recently had a similar argument before the High Court regarding the government's authority to regulate print materials under campaign finance laws, a notion that Chief Justice John Roberts said, "As a free-floating test for First Amendment coverage, that proposition is startling and dangerous."

She strongly supports the position of Justice Thurgood Marshall, of whom she wrote admiringly, "In Justice Marshall's view, constitutional interpretation demanded, above all else, one thing from the courts: it demanded that the courts show a special solicitude for the despised or disadvantaged. It was the role of the courts, in interpreting the Constitution, to protect the people who went unprotected by every other organ of government -- to safeguard the interests of people who had no other champion. The Court existed primarily to fulfill this mission. ... She has said, "The Constitution, as originally drafted and conceived, was 'defective.' The Constitution today ... contains a great deal to be proud of. But the credit does not belong to the Framers. It belongs to those who refused to acquiesce in outdated notions of 'liberty,' 'justice,' and 'equality.'"

Setting aside her utter disdain for our Constitution and its authors, Kagan is flat-out wrong about the role of the High Court. It exists to safeguard the unbiased application of our Constitution's original intent. Marshall, previously delivered a lecture entitled, "The Constitution: A Living Document," in which he argued that the Constitution must be interpreted in a way that succumbs to the contemporary political, moral and cultural climate.

Promoters of a "living constitution" have judicial activists who have continuously tried to amend our Constitution by judicial fiat rather than its prescribed method in Article V. There is no doubt that Kagan will advocate that heretical and treasonous interpretation.

Obama claims that Kagan understands the law "not as an intellectual exercise or words on a page -- but as it affects the lives of ordinary people." Not as "words on a page"? Truly a revisionist President. It is exactly that rejection of plain language of our Constitution that caused President Thomas Jefferson to call the court "the despotic branch."

Back in 1987, during confirmation hearings for Judge Robert Bork (a man that history has shown was one of the most qualified jurists ever nominated to the High Court), one Leftist senator commented, "The Framers intended the Senate to take the broadest view of its constitutional responsibility," especially in regard to the nominee's "political, legal and constitutional views." That senator was Joe Biden, who rejected Judge Bork because he was a "constitutional constructionist," which was exactly the trait our Founders wanted in jurists.

Hopefully there are enough protectors (with enough common sense) of our Constitution in the Senate today who will question Kagan's "political, legal and constitutional views," and reject her nomination.

DE