Republicans Turn Judicial Power Into a Campaign Issue
Republican presidential candidates are issuing biting and sustained attacks on the federal courts and the role they play in American life, reflecting and stoking skepticism among conservatives about the judiciary.
Gov. Rick Perry of Texas favors term limits for Supreme Court justices. Representatives Michele Bachmann of Minnesota and Ron Paul of Texas say they would forbid the court from deciding cases concerning same-sex marriage. Newt Gingrich, the former House speaker, and for Senator Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania want to abolish the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, calling it “a rogue court” that is “consistently radical.”
“If you want to send a signal to judges that we are tired of them feeling that these elites in society can dictate to us,” Mr. Santorum said at an event in Ames, Iowa, “then you have to fight back. I will fight back.”
Criticism of “activist judges” and of particular Supreme Court decisions has long been a staple of political campaigns. But the new attacks, coming from most of the Republican candidates, are raising broader questions about how the legal system might be reshaped if one of them is elected to the White House next year.
The complaints are in line with their general opposition to federal authority. Like the elected branches of the federal government, they say, the federal judiciary has become too powerful and intrusive.
Many of the candidates’ proposals concerning the federal courts would, even with Congressional backing, face daunting constitutional obstacles. Yet Congress can limit spending on the courts, short of cutting judges’ salaries, and it may well be able narrow the jurisdiction of the federal courts in important ways.
The candidates’ criticism reflects a growing desire among conservatives for a return to a court system that they say the country’s founders envisioned.
The political calculus is similar, too. The rise of the Tea Party in states like Iowa and South Carolina has created a receptive audience for candidates who raise doubts about whether the court system is hindering the causes that these voters believe in.
“These threats go far beyond normal campaign season posturing,” said Bert Brandenburg, executive director of Justice at Stake, a research and advocacy group that seeks to protect judicial independence. “They sound populist, but the proposal is to make courts answer to politicians and interest groups.”
Mitt Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts, has so far shied away from the far-reaching criticisms of his rivals. At a conservative forum in South Carolina he dismissed the idea of a Congressional confrontation with the Supreme Court over abortion, saying, “I’m not looking to create a constitutional crisis.”
But his rivals have shown no such reticence in attacking a federal court system in which their side has achieved significant victories…