The New Gilded Age Court

Above: Chief Justice John Roberts

Allow me to expand on Scott’s point from earlier about the Supreme Court becoming the postbellum Democratic Party incarnate. I’d say it is further than that. The current Supreme Court is the recreation of the Gilded Age courts. The same courts deciding Plessy and all the other cases of the late nineteenth century and early twentieth century that approved of Jim Crow, flushed the Civil War amendments down the toilet, stole land grants from Mexican-Americans, and took away any and all rights from Native Americans were the same courts providing new rights to corporations and deciding cases like Lochner.

Today, the same court once again flushing those Civil War amendments down the toilet is the same court that decided Citizens United and is about to kneecap organized labor in Friedrichs. Never mind that a lot of states like having functional public sector unions. In fact, never mind any evidence. This is about conservative ideology, as are the racial cases. The turn against Reconstruction is the just part and parcel of the larger turn against the 150 years of reform. Other parts are the turn against the Great Society, the turn against the New Deal, and the turn against the Progressive Era. The New Gilded Age is not hyperbole. It is the stated goal of the conservative movement. And they have enough judges on the Supreme Court and of course enough state legislatures and governors to see that increasingly ensconced into American law.

In other words, H.A. Goodman and Walker Bragman are totally right about the 2016 election and if the Democrats nominate Hillary, the nation would be better off with Ted Cruz.