Commentary
As a believer in Constitutional originalism, Jason l. Riley’s column, “Clarence Thomas, Stalwart for the Constitution,” in the Wall Street Journal was of interest to me. As I was reading it, it was like Justice Samuel Alito was looking over my shoulder. The smiling photo of him on the cover of Mollie Hemingway’s book, “Alito,” a Father’s Day gift, seemed to be smiling at me from the table next to me.
In her book, Hemmingway refers to Alito as a “practical originalist,” that is, he isn’t a rigid originalist like Scalia and Thomas, providing him with an opportunity lo overturn flawed precedents, such as those dealing with abortion, religious freedom, the power of administrative agencies (bureaucrats), and affirmative action.
Having recently viewed Mark Levin’s interview of Sen. Ted Cruz about the senator’s book about Thomas, “Going Further: The Incomparable Clarence Thomas,” I recalled law professor Alan Dershowitz commenting that Cruz was one of his brightest students at Harvard.
Cruz said that he tried to tell the story of Thomas “so that today’s audience, so that today’s young people can know who this extraordinary leader is and how he came from such challenging circumstances to the absolute pinnacle of American law.”
With so many young people getting their information from social media, like Tik Tok, I wish him luck.
I was naturally curious to read what Riley, a black journalist, thought of Thomas.
Riley reminded readers that it was George H. W. Bush who nominated Thomas, now “perhaps the most conservative member of the current court.”
“Throughout his tenure,” writes Riley, “Justice Thomas has insisted that the text and original meaning of the United States Constitution, not past decisions of the Supreme Court or politics should be the highest authority.”
“He is the leading advocate of originalism,” Riley quotes Cruz, “which holds that the Constitution doesn’t change meaning on a whim. The document means what the people who adopted it understood it to mean at the time.”
AND FINALLY: Those Michiganders supporting Abdul el-Sayed for the Senate over Mike Rogers are my October Fool’s Day nominees.
May those American’s currently swayed by the outlandish agenda of Democratic Socialism come to their senses in the next 33 days.
