The vindication of Clarence Thomas
Justice Clarence Thomas has long been a figure of ridicule and contempt, even hatred, from the left. Had he been a liberal, he almost certainly would have been their champion and hero: black, and raised in abject poverty with an extraordinary story that would ordinarily touch the heart. However, he’s not a liberal; not at all.
But it turns out that, jurisprudentially speaking, Thomas may have the last laugh:
Liberals have always dismissed Thomas as simply Scalia’s wingman, though no one who actually read with any care their separate opinions, concurrences, and dissents would think so. But the great thing about being a liberal is that you can just go with a cliche and skip the careful thinking part.
But now that the whole scene is in flux with the arrival of Justice Gorsuch—who, like Justice Thomas, believes that the natural law tradition in legal history stretching back to Roman times still has today what social scientists call “normative” value—the left is taking stock of things, and realizing that they are in a heap of trouble…
…Ian Millhiser, who writes about legal affairs for the Center for American Progress. He, too, thinks Thomas defines the center of gravity for conservative jurisprudence, calling Thomas “the most important legal thinker in America.”
The left still despises Thomas. But now they fear he was actually the vanguard of a way of thinking that could become far more dominant in American judicial thought. From that Millhiser article:
But if you’re asking how effectively Thomas helped sway Chief Justice John Roberts or Justice Anthony Kennedy to his own views, you are asking the wrong question. In a series of opinions joined by no other justice, Thomas waged a quiet war of ideas against twentieth century liberalism — and he won the hearts of a legion of conservative law students. Many of those former students are now old enough to be judges.
As of this writing, fully 20 percent of the judges Donald Trump appointed to the federal appellate bench are former Thomas clerks. Thomas lost the war for the present, but he is the future of legal conservatism. And he may soon be America’s future.
The author of those words is not at all pleased at the prospect.
How fitting that the S.C. Justice the Left hates most may well illustrate the truism that, “He who laughs last, laughs best”
Praise the Lord, and pass the ammunition.
Those funny Bozos who cling to their religion and their guns may yet prevail over the reflexive worshipers of the secular god to whom millions of unborn babies are sacrificed annually.
Clarence Thomas has been and still is a great gift to America. Anita Hill is not and never was.
Natural Law! Not one person in a hundred has a clue today. July 4 is cookout time for them, those who have never heard of Nature and Nature’s God. And Natural Law.
Thomas is a truly exemplary justice from the conservative/natural law perspective. A black, conservative man or woman has fled the ‘progressive’ plantation and scares the left to no end least he or she be an example to others. Hence, they must be ridiculed and demonized.
I’m not the first to say it by any stretch…but, “don’t get cocky.”
Justice Thomas is a unique presence on the Supreme Court.
AND, like the post about evaluating Presidents makes the point, he might well be a very quiet unassuming judicial tide-turner. We’ll see…maybe it’ll be evident after many of us are no longer here to know. I know what I’m praying for.
PS – still having to plug in the personal details…no autofill
“The author of those words is not at all pleased at the prospect.”
Well, I certainly am!
John Guilfoyle:
It doesn’t even give you suggestions when you click in the boxes and type the first letter?
Neo…Nope.
Milhiser may not be happy, but this Old Gray Badger is tickled pink that Justice Thomas may be the legal leader of the future. HUZZAH!
In general: May God by His providence rescue the United States out of her currently-widespread moral and intellectual ruin and preserve her from that ruin flowering into dire consequences in other spheres.
And, specifically: May God, if He chooses, make the jurisprudence of Clarence Thomas a channel of His providential mercies.