The Supreme Court and Civil Rights
Speech by Wade Henderson on February 10, 2005.
Thank you, Roberta [Achtenberg], for that great introduction. Roberta is a fighter for human rights who served with distinction on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors and at the Department of Housing and Urban Development during the Clinton Administration. I am delighted to see that she is vice president for public policy at the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce. It's a coup for you both.
Before I begin my remarks I want to take a moment to acknowledge my colleagues here in San Francisco, and across the state, who have worked to conduct what has been a terrifically important public education campaign on the critical issues of today, including maintaining an independent and fair federal judiciary. Susan Lerner, Eva Paterson, and many others - your leadership and work is so important. On behalf of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, I thank you.
It's an honor to be here tonight with the Commonwealth Club, the oldest and largest public affairs forum in America.
This Club was founded at the beginning of the last century at a time when the nation was grappling with the issues of industrialization, urbanization, and discrimination. It was during the Progressive Era, and Republicans and Democrats alike agreed that Americans needed to work together through their government to help each other cope with a new and changing world.
Now, you are celebrating your 102nd birthday at another time of change and challenge. The global economy and the information age are bringing people closer together throughout the world, but economic inequalities, social divisions, and the consequences of decades of discrimination are driving people further apart here at home. Unfortunately, unlike the turn of the last century, this is not a progressive era but rather a time when hard-core conservatives are in control of the White House, the Congress, and, increasingly, the federal courts as well.
I'm here tonight to talk about the danger that the determined ideologues who already hold sway over the executive and legislative branches of the federal government will tighten their grip on the third branch - the judiciary -- as well.
My topic tonight - the Supreme Court and Civil Rights - is very timely. With the help of the departing Attorney General John Ashcroft and his designated successor, Alberto Gonzales, who currently serves as White House Counsel, President Bush has been remaking the federal bench, seat by seat and court by court.
Soon, they may have the chance to solidify their ideological brand on our nation's highest court, too. The Supreme Court will almost certainly see several vacancies over the next few years. And, with Chief Justice Rehnquist eighty and ailing, his successor may be nominated very soon indeed.
The Bush Administration and its allies in the Senate are already preparing for the days when these vacancies emerge, and the excessiveness of their tactics suggests the extremism of their agenda. When the Senate refused to confirm ten of President Bush's nominees for federal appeals courts, having already approved 204 judges during his first term, the President went ahead and re-nominated them a day before Christmas eve, when the Senate was not in session, proving yet again that wonderful aphorism, "No good deed goes unpunished."
Now that vacancies are looming on the Supreme Court, the Senate Majority Leader, Bill Frist, has threatened to change the Senate's rules to cut off debate and force immediate party-line votes on nominations for the federal courts. This strategy has been called "the nuclear option;" and, just like nuclear war, this tactic will destroy targets for miles around, including the traditions of the Senate, the independence of the judiciary, and the basic rights of everyday Americans whose cases come before the courts.
The Supreme Court has the last word on the great legal issues of our times. It is the last line of defense for civil rights, women's rights, workers' rights, environmental protection, and every American's fundamental freedoms.
So, if the Supreme Court becomes the instrument of ideologues dedicated to reversing a century of social progress, we will all feel the consequences in our daily lives. Whether we are most concerned about preventing discrimination, preserving a woman's right to choose, protecting working Americans, or preserving our personal liberties, the most powerful court in this country will have made up its mind before it hears our case.
More than a century ago, the great humorist Finley Peter Dunne said, "The Supreme Court follows the election returns." The fact is: the battles over Supreme Court nominations - and Supreme Court decisions - never take place in a vacuum. So let's look at the political, philosophical, and historical context for the great debate that will likely take place when President Bush makes his first nomination for the nation's highest court.
While we meet here tonight, a continent and three time zones away, President Bush will be addressing the Congress and the country about the State of the Union. When he addressed the nation and the world two weeks ago, he made some eloquent points. But we have yet to see whether, in his second term, his deeds will finally live up to his words.
In his inaugural address, President Bush spoke of "the unfinished work of American freedom." He declared, "Our country must abandon all the habits of racism, because we cannot carry the message of freedom and the baggage of bigotry at the same time." He acknowledged: "We have known divisions, which must be healed to move forward in great purposes." And he promised that he would "strive in good faith to heal" those divisions.
Perhaps he will explain tonight in his State of the Union Address what he didn't elaborate upon in his Inaugural Address.
He could begin by pledging to enforce the nation's laws against discrimination in all its forms and against the abuse of women, working people, consumers, and Americans with Disabilities. He could say that he will give America a Justice Department that is worthy of its name. And he could commit himself to work with Senators from both parties to select judges who are committed to the letter and the spirit of those laws.
That would be in keeping with the best of our nation's history, over the past century - a history that was written by presidents, members of the U.S. House and Senate, and federal judges who belonged to both parties, but who shared a commitment to moving America forward to the fulfillment of its highest ideals.
They wrote a record, many of whose achievements we commemorated last year and continue to celebrate this year. But every anniversary presents a challenge: Will we continue to move forward on freedom's journey. Or will we change course and turn back to old battles and ancient injustices?
Last year, we celebrated the 50th anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education and the 40th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act, which together brought us several steps closer to becoming "one nation with liberty and justice for all." But today we are more functionally segregated by race - and our politics is more polarized by region and religion - than at any time in the last 30 years.
This year, we will celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Voting Rights Act, which made America a democracy in our practice as well as our promise. But, in Florida in 2000 and in Ohio in 2004, we still could not be sure that all Americans would have the right to cast their votes and have them counted.
And this year, we will also mark the 70th anniversary of the National Labor Relations Act, which guarantees working Americans the right to organize unions and bargain with their employers for better pay, benefits, and working conditions. Together with the laws that created the minimum wage and guaranteed workers overtime pay, our nation's labor laws helped to create the modern middle class.
But now, the Administration
