Justice Kennedy’s Role in Bringing Down America
On June 27, Justice Anthony Kennedy announced his retirement. He said that he would step down on July 31 after 30 years on the United States Supreme Court. This gives President Donald Trump time to nominate his replacement before midterm elections.
Since Kennedy joined the Supreme Court in 1988, he has authored 276 majority opinions, 165 concurring opinions, and 100 dissenting opinions. Unlike his colleagues, he has not made legal decisions according to a consistent ideology. He has voted with the court’s progressive justices almost as often as he has with its conservative justices.
Kennedy has cast the tie-breaking vote in a legion of controversial cases. This is why he has been called “the most important voter in America” and even “King Kennedy.” He has played a huge role in liberalizing American society. And no matter who his replacement is, the moral and societal transformation Kennedy enabled will not be easily undone.
You need to know what happened to America in 1987!
Transforming America
In 1992, Kennedy joined with justices Sandra Day O’Connor and David Souter to write the plurality decision in Planned Parenthood v. Casey. This case confirmed the Roe v. Wade decision that a woman’s right to privacy allows her to murder her unborn child. It also overturned a requirement that a woman notify her husband before having an abortion.
In 2003, Kennedy wrote the majority opinion in Lawrence v. Texas. This case overturned judicial precedent to make homosexual activity legal in every U.S. state and territory. It struck down anti-sodomy laws in Texas and 13 other states. It declared consensual sex a protected liberty under the due process clause of the 14th Amendment.
In 2015, Kennedy cast the tie-breaking vote and authored the majority opinion in Obergefell v. Hodges. This landmark case struck down state bans on same-sex “marriage.” It ruled that same-sex couples have a right to marry, guaranteed by the due process clause and equal protections clause of the 14th Amendment.
In these cases and others, Kennedy enacted policies on abortion, affirmative action and homosexuality that Congress would not approve. How different would the nation be today if another justice had been appointed in his place?
An Attack on Law
In his booklet America Under Attack, Trumpet editor in chief Gerald Flurry writes that an “event occurred in 1986 that marked a major turning point in history.” A year after this event took place, President Ronald Reagan nominated Judge Robert Bork to a seat on the Supreme Court. Within 45 minutes of his nomination, however, Sen. Ted Kennedy began a still-infamous, nationally televised speech on the Senate floor demonizing Judge Bork in a shocking way.
Why?
Bork was one of the nation’s fiercest and most articulate defenders of interpreting the Constitution as it is written. Senator Kennedy argued that Judge Bork’s judicial philosophy would lead to a “Bork’s America” of back-alley abortions, segregation, censorship and midnight police raids. None of these accusations were true, but the attack still worked.
The Senate did not confirm Judge Bork, and he never took a seat on the Supreme Court. President Reagan then chose Anthony Kennedy as a compromise candidate. The Senate confirmed him by a unanimous vote of 97 to 0. And in the three decades since, Justice Kennedy has redefined the legal definitions of marriage and human life itself.
The tide turned in 1987. Law started to get weaker, and lawlessness much, much stronger. To learn what happened in 1986 that made such a huge impact on our world, request a free copy of America Under Attack, by Gerald Flurry.
