Public Opinion Continues to Ignore Ad Hoc Theories About “Judicial Activism”
As national opinion continues to become more supportive of same-sex marriage, it’s worth once again remembering how frequently it was said that Goodridge was a disaster for the same-sex marriage movement. Generally, ignoring advice from your enemies that you unilaterally disarm is a sound principle.
In addition to noting the lopsided vote in the Mass. legislature against putting the gay-marriage-overturn question on the ballot (the anti-gay backlash couldn’t even get 25%), it’s also worth noting that, in the very next election after Goodridge, zero pro-gay-marriage legislators lost their seats, while a couple of anti-gay marriage legislators did so.
An acquaintance’s mother was a single-issue anti-gay-marriage state senate candidate in 2004. I stood out for her opponent and had some friendly talks with other campaign volunteers of the various campaigns, including hers. Her man was insisting to me and our city councilor that Worcester could have a “National League baseball team, just like the Mets” if city hall got its act together. Also he did not seem to like gay people very much.
Then why would he want a National League team?
Aaaaa-oooooo!
The way I recall this argument being framed, was that judicial activism wasn’t so bad for the cause per se. but rather the political party championing the cause. Roe v Wade is the biggie here, because it took a winning position (pro-choice) off the political table. Today a Dem saying some repub has radical views on choice doesn’t concern anyone except pro-choice activists. But if abortion were not a right, the issue would be rather salient.
It also delivered to the repubs an important faction, evangelicals and other anti-abortion single-issue voters. If laws against abortion were constitutional, they would have less to complain about, since they would simply have to just convince the rest of us. Democracy defanged them.
There was a thread over at ThinkProgess (I think it was Yglesias’ place) where they debated if the progressive focus on classical-liberal freedoms (I’m not sure if they used that word) for women and minorities (civil rights act, abortion, gay rights) hurt the larger cause (economic equality). Obama had just delivered the repeal of DADT but on HCR he underperformed, they thought. Before LBJ, things were revered. The New Deal Coalition was a juggernaut but it also consisted of segregationists (I’m not sure if anyone said it as explicitly as I just did).
Looking back at Brown vs Board I don’t know why this is even a question. The liberal establishment made life a living hell for Ike and the NAACP as they tried to enforce the decision in Little Rock. LBJ dropped the most jawdropping false equivalence in American history (“There should be no troops from either side patrolling our school campuses anywhere”). JFK was passive, playing both sides of the fence. Stevenson refused to support military intervention until the decision was made, while his running mate spewed venom, “occupying Little Rock has brought about further deterioration of relations and further embitterment between our Negro and white citizens.”
These men claimed concern for blacks and for the administration. Dean Acheson warned that the president “may find that getting the troops out is a much more difficult proposition than getting them in.” But neither the civil rights movement or Ike would heed their advice. I can’t see how they were at all hurt by the events that transpired. They both gained considerably, in fact.
So yeah, “ignoring advice from your enemies that you unilaterally disarm is a sound principle”.