Uncle Roger's Notebooks of Daily Life

What would you want your legacy to be?

There are two issues that are almost certainly going to end up before the current (Roberts, Scalia, Thomas, etc.) Supreme Court or the United States and which will have significant cultural impact. In both cases, the constitutional law is clear and absolute but how the SCOTUS will rule, especially with Scalia and Thomas involved, is not so clear.

Despite being passionately concerned with these issues, the Court's actual decision is not what concerns me at the moment. You see, while I definitely want the justices to reach the correct conclusion, I don't think it matters -- in the long run -- what they decide.

The two cases that are wending their way towards the SCOTUS are Perry v. Schwarzenegger (aka The Prop. 8 Trial) and Newdow v. Rio Linda Union School District (aka The "Under God" Trial). The first examines the constitutionality of discriminating on the basis of sexual orientation while the latter examines whether forcing children to pledge that our nation is "under god" is establishing a state religion.

The Prop. 8 trial has yet to be decided but based on the trial it is clear that the only possible conclusion is that Prop. 8 is unconstitutional. Either way, however, the case will almost certainly be appealed to the SCOTUS where an overly religious (Kennedy, Scalia, Thomas, Roberts, Alito, and Sotomayor are reportedly Catholic; Ginsburg and Breyer are Jewish; Stevens is Protestant) group of justices could go either way.

In the case of the constitutionality of the phrase "under god" in the pledge of allegiance (which I've written about before), the ruling is in -- it's not religious nor was adding the phrase in 1954 prompted by religious belief, despite having been championed by the Knights of Columbus, the catholic fraternal organization that, interestingly, also contributed heavily to the passage of Prop. 8, and by George MacPherson Docherty, pastor of the New York Avenue Presbyterian Church who, while President Eisenhower was in attendance to honor Lincoln's birthday, gave a sermon calling for the addition of the phrase to the pledge as being "the characteristic and definitive factor in the American way of life."

Given the ludicrousness of the argument and the dissenting opinion being twice as long as the majority, it is likely that this decision will be appealed as well. Again, given the religious leanings of the current justices, the final outcome of this case is uncertain. Lest you think that there is no way a Supreme Court justice could let his religious bias influence his judgement, I will quote Justice Scalia when hearing testimony in the case of Salazar vs. Buono concerning a cross erected on government land as a memorial to WWI veterans:

"It's erected as a war memorial!" replies Scalia. "I assume it is erected in honor of all of the war dead. The cross is the most common symbol of ... of ... of the resting place of the dead."

Eliasberg dares to correct him: "The cross is the most common symbol of the resting place of Christians. I have been in Jewish cemeteries. There is never a cross on a tombstone of a Jew."

"I don’t think you can leap from that to the conclusion that the only war dead the cross honors are the Christian war dead," thunders Scalia. "I think that's an outrageous conclusion!"

So, yes, we have at least one justice that believes that Christian symbolism is perfectly acceptable for government use. And where Scalia goes, so too goes Thomas. And, of course, being gay is a big no-no for Catholics too (except for priests and little boys). So who knows what the court will decide on these two issues. And, frankly, who cares?

Yes, a lot of people will suffer, physically and emotionally, if the SCOTUS allows Prop. 8 and "under god" to stand, but, as I noted above, it won't matter in the long run.

It is quite clear that Americans are becoming more and more accepting of gays and lesbians; by the time my kids are all old enough to marry, I suspect it will be a non-issue. Similarly, while it will probably take longer, I think religion is on its way out, helped in large part by the Catholic Church itself. The more they try to cover up the atrocities committed by their so-called agents of god the more they tear themselves down. And, of course, it's not limited to the Catholic Church -- the problem is just as bad in other Christian religions. And once Christianity is gone, I seriously doubt that Islam will fill its place, nor will any significant numbers turn to Scientology or any other set of superstitions.

So the real question facing the SCOTUS is how they want to be remembered. What do they want their legacy to be?

Do they want to be remembered like Williams Jennings Bryan -- an anti-intellectual buffoon, passed over by history and remembered solely as a minor stumbling block on the road of progress or as forward-thinking jurists who protected and upheld the constitution in the face of current popular opinion and, indeed, even their own personal beliefs?

I know what I would do -- I try to teach my kids to do what's right, not what's popular, easy, or even personally desirable and I am insanely proud when they do so. I would expect no less of myself and I expect no less of the Supreme Court of the United States.

Related Links The Prop. 8 Trial The "Under God" Trial ParentDish: What's Wrong With The Pledge Wonkette: Scalia Goes Nuts During Christian-y Court Case

[ Posted: 23:00 | home | print ]