And Then There Were Nine
Amy Coney Barrett’s confirmation as the 9th Justice on a now full Supreme Court represents the culmination of a process begun over one month ago. Her nomination, subsequent vetting and hearing before the United States Senate Judiciary Committee and confirmation on the Floor of the United States Senate highlights a process in which she answered two straight 10 hour days of countless questioning as well as answers she provided in writing to an additional 430 questions submitted by Senators. She was subjected to the Left’s effort to cast her as someone who had brokered some sort of ‘back room deal’ with President Trump to dismantle Americans’ healthcare protections, and they even went so far as to throw religious bigotry her way for putting her Catholic faith at the center of her life. But in the end, our Constitution, as it always does, provided the pathway for a process of an appropriate length of hearing, questioning, advice, consent and confirmation of Judge Barrett.
Through the first three days of confirmation hearings, we watched as Democrat Senators lifted the talking points of the Left and reiterated outrageous claims about some sort of hidden agenda Coney Barrett simply must have. The clamored about her desire to end pre-existing conditions (untrue), they complained about not having enough time to appropriately vet her (untrue) – but then wasted their entire questioning time with campaign style speeches attacking President Trump, while not actually asking Judge Barrett any questions. They protested about her honoring Supreme Court nominee precedent and not indicating how she would rule on hypothetical cases or provide criticisms of past court rulings. In the end, they refused to even do their Senatorial duty and walked out of the vote to advance her nomination to the full U.S. Senate body.
On the final day of hearings, we learned more about Amy Coney Barrett the person, not the judge. In remarkable testimony from Laura Wolk, the first blind woman to clerk at the Supreme Court, we heard about how Barrett helped guide and mentor her while she was enrolled at Notre Dame’s Law School. Laura talked about struggling during her first semester of Law School; how technological limitations were holding her back from succeeding and how she was having to spend an inordinate amount of time dealing with things like navigating the grocery store on her own in a new area, to figuring out how to get the equipment she needed to keep up with her studies and that she was falling behind, and fearing failing out. She talked about being assigned to one of Judge Barrett’s classes and when confiding in Judge Barrett her struggles, she shared the now famous response from Judge Barrett: “Laura, this is no longer your problem. It’s my problem.” The investment Judge Barrett made in her had a direct impact – it helped her succeed as a law student and become a clerk on the Supreme Court.
In the end, what has been a respected and historical confirmation process which honored tradition, precedent and dignity (a stark contrast to the confirmation hearings of Justice Kavanaugh in 2018), a process which had even Democrat Ranking Senator Dianne Feinstein thanking the Chair, Senator Lindsey Graham and saying, “This has been one of the best set of hearings that I’ve participated in.”, is now being met with calls from the insatiable leftist base of the Democrat Party to drastically expand the number of Supreme Court Justices. In their scheme, their chosen Presidential Candidate, Joe Biden, is so moldable with no backbone, that he will listen to their demands to expand the size of the Supreme Court and add 4 or more new Liberal Judges to the highest court in the land. Never mind that nine has been the historical precedent for over 150 years of our Supreme Court, the Left wants to see the courts numbers stand at 11, 13, or even more. The term, called “packing the court” has been renounced by numerous scholars, judges and even the late Ruth Bader Ginsburg herself who said “Nine seems to be a good number. It’s been that way for a long time…I think it was a bad idea when President Franklin Roosevelt tried to pack the court.” Her, nor her wishes, matter to the Left, just their agenda to radically tear down the America you and I love. This topic alone represents one of the most important issues facing voters, yet when asked about it, both Senator Harris and Vice President Biden have either refused to directly answer their plans for the Supreme Court, or given non sensical answers about how President Trump is packing the courts. That doesn’t even make sense. Just because President Trump has been successful in nominating and confirming close to 250 federal judges across the country, including now multiple Supreme Court Justices, doesn’t mean he is packing the court; it means he has been successful in nominating extremely qualified jurists to our nation’s courts with records of upholding law, not legislating from the bench and reading the Constitution as written. It means he has been successful in working with all branches of government, but especially the United States Senate in using his lifelong negotiating skills to get confirmation votes on those he nominates. Most importantly, let’s not forget, it was the Democrat controlled Senate in 2013 under Senator Harry Reid who changed the rules to allow judge confirmations to advance on a simple majority vote versus the 60 vote filibuster threshold – while Democrats may be mad now how those circumstances have played out, they have no one to blame but themselves.
Judge Barrett proved herself to be qualified and up to the task of serving on our nation’s highest bench. She skillfully handled the attacks from the Left and has instantly become a role model for so many young women out there entering the field of Law. Anyone actually watching those hearings could draw no other conclusion. But that’s not what this is about. She was going to be torn down regardless of the type of judge, teacher, mentor, and mother she is, simply because the Left hates the President who nominated her. 150 years of precedent thrown away because of the Leadership of one party’s refusal to say no to those taking over their political party – that’s the reality and it’s a shame. Their calls now to ‘pack the court’ in response to Judge Barrett’s confirmation are as ridiculous as their attacks on her character. The only thing more ridiculous than those plans is Vice President Biden’s actual refusal to denounce them.
