Anita Hill’s dead giveaway on judicial philosophy

As if we needed one to know where she stands. But it’s always nice to have solid evidence.

Responding to a Vanity Fair writer who asked her last December who she might like to see nominated for the Supreme Court, Hill named a few names and closed her note with this admission that she sees the Supreme Court as a Supreme Legislature (emphasis mine):

I’d also like for him to go outside the Northeast corridor and Ivy League Schools for someone who has been on a state supreme court deciding significant social/economic issues.

They don’t even try to hide it anymore.

 Then again, as Robert L. from Neo-Libertarian at Large noted in a comment on my post about filibustering radical judicial nominees:

I think part of the dilemma is that there is a game of chicken going on over who is going to be the first to admit that SCOTUS has turned into just another legislative/political body.

Both parties, the Republicans very belatedly, are increasingly maneuvering based on this assumption but the messenger on this issue will definitely be shot.

I think we can forget about the court ever settling just legal disputes instead of moral/social/economic ones. That horse left the barn a long time ago. While I think certain conservative judges may claim in good faith that their job is to avoid deciding social issues, these matters are thrust upon them.

Perhaps conservatives and/or Republicans could, as Robert L. suggests, be more honest about the reality of the Supreme Court.  That, of course, would draw howls from the left along the lines of “Hypocrites!  For years, you’ve railed against using the court to advance a social agenda, and now you’re trying to do the same thing!”

But what choice do we have?  If we refuse to acknowledge the court’s function, then it becomes worse than a mechanism for social change. It becomes a mechanism for one way social change. Maybe it’s about time we just give up and play by the rules liberals have established.