The U.S. Supreme Court just finished its term, and the left could not be angrier. Gun rights were upheld when the Court ruled that the government does not get to decide why people can carry guns, religious freedom endured when the Court ruled that a coach has the right to privately pray on the football field, and the ability to protect the right to life was returned to the states when Roe v. Wade was overturned.
Now, House Democrats have introduced legislation to expand the Court to create a liberal majority. Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez called the Supreme Court “illegitimate.” The call is growing louder to completely abolish the Supreme Court in its entirety. As also shown by the push to abolish the electoral college and the Senate filibuster, when the left does not get its way, its solution is to change the rules to ensure that they do next time.
However, there is a way to be pro-abortion and anti-Roe or anti-gun but agree with the Court’s pro-second amendment ruling. In fact, some of the justices of the Supreme Court might have just given the states the green light to enact laws with which they personally do not agree. All opinions on abortion, guns, prayer, or any other political issue are irrelevant in deciding a case. What matters is constitutionality.
Is Mississippi’s abortion ban after 15 weeks constitutional? The Supreme Court ruled that it is in part because the Constitution never mentions abortion. It ruled that New York’s gun law, which required that gun owners prove their reasoning for owning guns, was unconstitutional in part because the Constitution clearly enumerates and protects the right to keep and bear arms. The same can be said about prayer.
Article I of the Constitution gives the legislature the ability to make laws. Because the left cannot sell the public on their radical ideas, they rely on unelected jurists to carry out their agenda for them. That is how the three liberal justices routinely rule. However, Article III of the Constitution lays out clearly that the Supreme Court is meant to interpret the law, not make the law. As then-Judge Amy Coney Barrett said, “It’s never appropriate for a judge to impose that judge’s personal convictions, whether they derive from faith or anywhere else, on the law.”
Along with the federal government, the scope of the Supreme Court has grown too big. It issues national decrees, barring states from making their own laws based on inferred rights found nowhere in the Constitution, such as abortion. In Marbury v. Madison, Chief Justice John Marshall ruled that the Court has the power to strike down unconstitutional laws, which is called judicial review. This power, when used correctly, safeguards states’ and citizens’ rights from a tyrannical government. When misused, however, it bypasses people and their votes to create de facto legislation. Thankfully, the Court is just now beginning to undue faulty precedent and return power to elected lawmakers and localities.
If you disagree with a law that does not specifically contradict the Constitution, do not depend on the Supreme Court to make it go away. Instead, vote for whomever most closely reflects your values to the legislative branch of government, the ones who make the law.