SCOTUS Brief 3/21/2016
Natl Constitution Center CEO to AP: “Little doubt” Garland “will be with the new liberal majority in all the 5-4 cases that have gone the other way” – Sen. Hatch in USA Today: Senate Democrats willfully misinforming public on Constitutional role of the Senate in SCOTUS nomination – Washington Times: Garland consistently sides with labor unions in rulings – NRA WaPo Op-ed: Why we oppose Merrick Garland’s confirmation
To keep up with conservative & legal experts on Twitter follow:
- National Constitution Center CEO Jeffrey Rosen tells the Associated Press’ Mark Sherman “There’s little doubt that Merrick Garland will be with the new liberal majority in all the 5-4 cases that have gone the other way.”
AP: Garland would move Supreme Court to left, but how far?
“Merrick Garland’s judicial record over nearly two decades indicates he would side more often than not with the Supreme Court’s liberal justices on a range of cases splitting the court along ideological lines…Garland’s ascension could well be a game-changing moment that would make the court significantly more liberal on social issues, government regulation and access to the courts…In Garland’s votes and opinions on the federal appeals court in Washington, he often deferred to the policy choices of lawmakers, to regulations developed by federal agencies and to the actions of police and prosecutors… ‘The bottom line is there’s little doubt that Merrick Garland will be with the new liberal majority in all the 5-4 cases that have gone the other way, ranging from campaign finance to voting rights and affirmative action,’ said Jeffrey Rosen, president and CEO of the nonpartisan National Constitution Center.’”
- In an op-ed for USA Today, Senator Orrin Hatch (R-UT) writes that Senate Democrats are using a disingenuous slogan to misinform the public about the Senate’s role in the confirmation process for Supreme Court nominations.
Sen. Hatch in USA Today: My advice to Senate Democrats
“In an effort to attack Republicans fighting to preserve the integrity of the Supreme Court, Democrats have been repeating the same senseless slogan for weeks: ‘Do your job.’ This sound bite is catchy, quotable and perfectly engineered for internet activism; it’s also entirely disingenuous…This tired tagline is simply a calculated attempt at political misdirection — one designed to hoodwink the American people into thinking that the Senate is nothing more than a rubberstamp in the Supreme Court confirmation process… According to progressives, it seems that ‘doing your job’ entails confirming whomever President Obama nominates to the Supreme Court, regardless of the circumstances… But the Constitution also makes the Senate a coequal partner in the confirmation process by granting the upper chamber the power to provide its advice and decide whether to grant or withhold its consent to the president’s nominee. This week, I stood with a majority of my Senate colleagues in concluding that the best way to exercise our advice-and-consent power is to conduct the confirmation process after the presidential election.”
- The Washington Times’ Dave Boyer writes that Merrick Garland has consistently sided with labor unions in his decisions.
Washington Times: Garland rulings consistently side with labor unions
“An analysis of Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland’s judicial decisions on labor disputes has found that he nearly always sides with unions. The onlabor.org website, a blog run by Harvard Law School professors Benjamin Sachs and Jack Goldsmith, found that Judge Garland has written the majority opinion in 22 cases that considered appeals of National Labor Relations Board decisions between 1997 and this year. He sided with the NLRB in 18 of those decisions, agreeing with the agency’s interpretation that an employer committed unfair labor practices. In all of those cases, the blog said, ‘deference to the NLRB has had favorable consequences for labor and unions.’”
- The NRA’s Chris Cox writes in the Washington Post that Merrick Garland would be a reliable fifth vote on the court against the Second Amendement.
NRA’s Chris Cox in the Washington Post: Why we oppose Merrick Garland’s Supreme Court nomination
“With Scalia’s tragic passing, there is no longer a majority of support for Heller and McDonald among the justices. Four justices believe law-abiding Americans have the right to own a gun for self-defense, including handguns. Four justices do not. The math is simple — and frightening…Obama has already nominated two Supreme Court justices who oppose our fundamental individual right to own firearms safely and responsibly. The NRA knows better than to expect anything different with his third choice…If Garland joins Ginsburg, Stephen G. Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan on the court, we believe they will overturn Heller and McDonald at the first opportunity.”
