Loving Our Constitution

September 28, 2020 (1,000 words)

Legendary Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg died on Friday, September 18, at the age of 87. On Saturday, September 26, President Trump announced his choice to fill the vacancy her passing leaves on the high court: Amy Coney-Barrett, age 48.

During an introductory news conference held in the White House Rose Garden, Ms. Barrett made a good first impression with a brief statement. What was most striking about that statement is how one could easily tell she composed these remarks herself, without the aid of a professional speech-writer to “sharpen the messaging.” She came across as articulate, sincere, and down-to-earth, someone we can all relate to and who is used to relating to us.

Hearing and watching her one couldn’t help but wonder how much better the country would be doing right now, if only our President were half as classy, composed, and coherent as this woman appears to be.

She began by declaring “I love our country, and I love our Constitution” – sentiments most everyone listening to her would enthusiastically agree with. But I’m wondering if there is such a thing as loving our Constitution too much. Is there such a thing as putting too much faith in it?

This question should not be mistaken as my taking sides in the long-running “original intent” versus “living document” debate. No, what I have in mind by posing this query will not be welcome news to partisans on either side of this steep ideological divide.

Ms. Barrett was a law professor at Notre Dame before being confirmed by the Senate as a judge for the U.S. Court of Appeals in October 2017. She is well-known as an “original intent” kind of person.

Barrett does not believe a judge should “create new law” by “legislating from the bench.” The job of a judge is to interpret the law as the people who wrote that law intended. It boils down to “the primacy of the text.” The Constitution means what it meant to those who ratified it.

Yes, that’s right, we’re talking about the late 18^th Century understanding of the text. For the civil rights amendments that would be the post-Civil War Reconstruction understanding, etc. The rationale for this approach is nothing less than democracy itself: The enacted text went through the process of ratification to become a law in the first place. If we change that law now to comport with our current understanding, or with what we may want those laws to mean, then it ceases to have democratic legitimacy.

Stressing “original intent” in this way is not to claim the Constitution has all the answers or should call all the shots, but rather to see it as setting a reliable, unchanging baseline. This still leaves plenty of room for social change. However, any topic the Constitution does not specifically describe as off limits should be up to the public to make decisions about, not the courts.

Judiciously-speaking, then, Amy Coney-Barrett’s bottom line is this: Any social change should come only through the democratic process. If you want to alter the Constitution, do it through an amendment. If you want to change a statute, do it through the Congress or the State legislatures.

This leads me to the contentious issue of legalized abortion. In the wake of her recently announced nomination, Ms. Barrett is being hailed as a dream come true by the right, and condemned as a nightmare by the left. The latter group describes her as a “dangerous” conservative who will turn back the clock on women’s rights to the dark days of the 1950s, and return us to the era of back alley abortions. Without wanting to sound too glib, I guess you could say the former group is pretty much hoping for the same thing.

The pro-life crowd is positively giddy with anticipation at this latest turn of events. Someone who takes a liberal or activist approach to interpreting the Constitution (Ginsberg), is on the verge of being replaced by an individual (Barrett) who takes a conservative or “original intent” approach to that same document. But I’m afraid my pro-life friends are indulging some wishful thinking when considering the impact of this switch.

If I may insert some personal context here without being awkward, when the landmark Roe v. Wade decision was handed down on January 22, 1973, I wasn’t paying the least bit of attention. I was just a 19 year old know-it-all punk kid, abandoning the Catholic faith in favor of Buddhism, astrology, Abraham Maslow, and other assorted Maps of Consciousness. When I finally came to my senses twenty years later, all I heard about Roe v. Wade, over and over again, was how it represented “an exercise in raw judicial power.”

A majority of that Supreme Court found certain “penumbras” in the Constitution they claim protect a pregnant woman’s liberty to choose to have an abortion without excessive government restriction. With “liberty from government restriction” being the operative concept here.

The original intent gang may insist on social change through the democratic process, rather than allowing an activist judiciary to step in and hurry that process along. But there is no getting around the fact our Constitution is grounded in a strenuous belief in both “individual liberty” and protecting the citizenry from undue “government restriction.”

Pro-lifers may feel that legalized abortion takes these hallowed concepts a bit too far. But this is what we all signed up for when we signed on to a liberal democracy based on pluralism, when we put our faith in the democratic process to determine what laws would dictate our behavior.

Clinging to the hope that returning the Supreme Court to a majority of “original intent” Justices will somehow restore a Christian sense of moral order to our nation’s public proceedings, especially as those proceedings pertain to legalized abortion, is not the mark of someone who is cognizant of their surroundings, or who properly understands the philosophical framework of the country he or she is living in.

Robert J. Cavanaugh, Jr
September 28, 2020

Marital Fidelity and Mental Health

September 25, 2020 (49 words)

So the way it worked in our house growing up was, my mother loved us kids, and my father loved my mother. Despite everything. (And there was quite a lot of “everything,” as I recall.) This arrangement made for confident and well-adjusted children, if I do say so myself.

Robert J. Cavanaugh, Jr
September 25, 2020

Catholics for Biden

September 23, 2020 (992 words)

While I believe Catholics who identify as “conservative” in the practice of their faith should untether themselves from the Republican Party, I don’t think the newly-formed group Catholics for Biden offers a convincing rationale for doing so.

This group had its “virtual launch” on the evening of September 3, when a number of prominent Catholics who proudly identify as “progressive” said their peace. And Jesuit Father Thomas Reese, certainly no stranger to the spotlight himself, published a recent essay that laid out the group’s logic:

“A Catholic Democrat can vote for Biden, even if his policies promote abortion and gay marriage, as long as the voter’s intent is not to support those positions.

“A Catholic Democrat might feel impelled to vote for Biden despite his position on abortion and gay marriage because of other morally grave reasons, for example, his positions on racism, immigration, global warming, and COVID-19.”

Here I must say I appreciate the position I think Father Reese is trying to carve out for Catholics who find themselves dissenting from various aspects of the Republican party line. But I believe he could be far more persuasive in making the argument, if only he’d put his mind to it.

As things stand now, his approach can be too easily dismissed as an example of the “two out of three ain’t bad” sort of moral reasoning. It goes something like this: If we can improve the national response on racism and immigration, then we’ll just have to live with legalized abortion.

This sort of thinking just doesn’t fly with me.

It’s very curious Father Reese’s litany of “morally grave reasons” does not include “economic injustice,” given the nation’s ongoing preoccupation with the subject, and how it was a central focus of certain candidates who led early polling for the Democratic nomination last year.

In much the same way a majority of those primary voters were eventually scared off by a vague sense that any discussion of adjusting our approach to economic behavior was tantamount to a complete conversion to “socialism,” so too this new group Catholics for Biden seems to want to steer clear of the subject as well.

But that’s exactly where this conversation needs to go. A reform of our economic rules of engagement holds the key to ending abortion, though I don’t have much company when making this assertion. None of my favorite pro-life friends and debate partners shows a willingness to entertain my logic. In fact, just last week one of them accused me of “economic reductionism.”

To be clear, I have not fallen in love with the Democrats. It’s more a case of my having lost all faith in the other side.

For blue-chip Republicans, the abortion issue is little more than an election year “social conservative” side hustle. Oh yeah, sure, between elections they are busy “transforming the federal judiciary” by appointing judges who will not “legislate an abortion agenda from the bench.” They can be counted on to sporadically discuss defunding Planned Parenthood. And they are always looking to pack the Supreme Court with as many pro-life Catholics jurists as they can find.

These stalwart gestures may strum the heartstrings of pro-lifers everywhere, but they are extended with an incontrovertible quid pro quo understanding: Every single appointee must adhere to the hardcore fiscal policy Republicans hold dear.

It is an unwavering commitment to the “free market” and to “economic freedom” – both of which happen to dovetail nicely with our national spirit of rugged individualism – that defines Republicans and is demanded of their followers.

They stand opposed to government “interference” and resist any attempt at regulation. This “absence of obstacles” approach to economic life has obviously worked out well for the clever and the advantaged among us, and has unleashed the movers and the shakers. But it leaves far too many rank-and-file folks out in the cold.

Pro-life Catholics have been overlooking these unfortunate Republican fiscal tendencies – which amount to a pronounced disdain for the common good – ever since Roe v. Wade.

In 2016 we were told to hold our nose and vote Republican, for the same reason as always – upcoming vacancies on the Supreme Court. The entrenched pro-life strategy is all about getting the right kind of people on the high court, which will eventually lead to a reversal of Roe v. Wade.

Well folks, here’s a news flash: I don’t think overturning Roe v. Wade will end abortion. It may start a civil war, but it won’t end abortion.

The only thing that will end abortion is when women stop choosing to have one.

This means addressing the mentality behind a woman’s decision to abort. And I see this equation as largely (if not exclusively) economic in nature. The female “haves” possess more money than they know what to do with. Their lives are centered on comfort and pleasure, and the career that makes it all possible. Newborns are resisted as an unnecessary part of life, an unwanted intrusion. The female “have nots,” meanwhile, live paycheck-to-paycheck, and feel constrained from welcoming a child (or another child) into the world.

Republican fiscal policy encourages this me-first attitude among the “haves,” and prevents the “have nots” from flourishing in all aspects of American society. The Democrat approval of abortion and gay marriage is surely a worrisome thing, but that support does not translate into a mandate. Republican fiscal policy, on the other hand, does in fact dictate the harsh, kill-or-be-killed culture we are all forced to accept.

From my perspective, fiscal conservatives blithely undermine the objectives of social conservatives at every turn, with policies that contradict their stated commitment to the pro-life cause, and decimate the “traditional family values” they are always touting.

So Jesuit Father Thomas Reese, do us all a favor. Roll up your sleeves and wade into the economic nitty-gritty that could explain why a committed pro-life Catholic might actually vote for an apostate politician like Joe Biden.

Robert J. Cavanaugh, Jr
September 23, 2020

Peggy Noonan’s World

September 13, 2020 (1,134 words)

The toughest part of being a name-brand commentator who gets published in the prestige press on a regular, weekly basis is that it can be hard to come up with worthwhile subject matter every single week.

Even when a kernel of an idea does present itself, the difficulty lies in fleshing things out properly on a deadline.

The careful reader can tell when a best-laid plan goes awry. The title of a column may be catchy. The opening sentence or two may draw you in. There may even be a musical phrase somewhere in there that especially resonates. But as you read on you realize this week’s installment is not really coming together or taking off as perhaps the author would have liked.

This is an occupational hazard that can happen to the best of them. To paraphrase Truman Capote’s famous critique of the old Jack Kerouac book On the Road, sometimes our favorite columnists are “writing,” and sometimes they’re “just typing.”

While it’s not my habit to check out the weekend edition of the Wall Street Journal every single Saturday, when I do Peggy Noonan’s prominent above-the-fold missive on the Op-Ed page is always a must-read.

Like the rest of her audience, i enjoy the way she cleverly manages to tease out the tenor of the times, and how she goes about her business with such a generous spirt. But occasionally her strokes are a bit too broad. Take for instance today, when she writes:

“America has now been battered by waves of distress. Summer is becoming fall and there’s little sign people want to remake everything in a progressive direction. They want stability, not a cultural and economic revolution, which many of the Democratic candidates seemed to imply they’d be open to, even support. They want the economy to come back. They don’t want looting in the streets; they feel they have already been looted, by history”

Here Ms. Noonan is pitch-perfect about the waves of distress, the desire for stability, and a longing for the economy to come back. But as to her claim “there’s little sign people want to remake everything in a progressive direction,” well, that would depend on what is meant by “everything” and “progressive.”

Then let’s hone in specifically on Noonan’s contention the public has little taste at this time for “cultural and economic revolution.” One could say the dreaded cultural revolution has already occurred, to the chagrin of many. The only thing really up for debate is whether an economic revolution is warranted.

But I would like to avoid using the word “revolution” in this context, simply because it unnecessarily excites some folks and worries others. Better to plug in a word less fraught with emotion, such as “reform.”

In fact I would also suggest we rethink discussing potential economic adjustments as being in a “progressive direction.” In the present context, “progressive” is too easily misconstrued as being synonymous with “socialist,” and we all know the immediate tar and feathering a nefarious word like “socialist” comes in for.

Linguistic shorthand such as “progressive direction” or “economic revolution” can be helpful when trying to communicate. It can save time and bring the discussion to the crux of a matter more quickly. But such shorthand can also work against having a serious debate.

It can encourage the listener/reader to fall back on familiar, pre-established positions, and continue assuming he or she already knows all about what’s being presented for consideration.

No need to really pay attention to what’s being written or said. When this phenomenon kicks in, even the most detailed dissertation becomes little more than a sensation that washes over us, making us feel either content or disgruntled.

Therefore in many cases it would be better to avoid the linguistic shorthand altogether. This would force the listener/reader to actually think the issue through to a more logical and rational conclusion. Avoiding linguistic shorthand might have the same positive effect on the writer/speaker, as well.

Peggy Noonan’s take on there not being much of an appetite for systemic economic change is not necessarily off the mark. She speaks for a segment of the population who mainly yearns for the pre-pandemic status quo. These are the people she makes a point to rub elbows with on a regular basis. And these are the ones who naturally share her own well-established ideological preferences.

But there is another America apart from the one Ms. Noonan is able to personally interact with and deftly portray. To get a feel for that America one has to refer to the work of some of our other fine journalists. Consider the notable economist Paul Krugman, for example, whose opinions can be found in the New York Times.

Mr. Krugman is fond of reminding us that while the stock market may be doing well, even now during the pandemic, it’s not representative of the economy that most people experience. Just the other day he pointed out that more than half of all stocks are owned by 1% of the population. The bottom half of the population owns only 0.7% of the market.

As any wily pollster can tell you, the answer you get on a survey depends on how you phrase the question. A majority of people may recoil from the idea of having an abortion, but that same majority does not want to interfere with a woman making medical decisions about her own body.

In a similar way, a distinct majority have come to realize in their bones there is something fundamentally wrong with the winner-take-all form of casino capitalism that has come to dominant our society over the last fifty or sixty years. Much of that majority has also become frustrated with our current medical system and is willing to consider alternatives.

If you suggest taxing the largest (monopoly) fortunes, breaking up the big banks, and legislating against the more predatory aspect of private equity behavior, lots of regular, middle-of-the-road people will express support.

But when Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren or Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez takes to the stump and pounds the podium to advocate on behalf of such issues, it turns off those same, previously receptive individuals. In this case I would say certain folks are shooting the messenger without paying proper attention to the message.

The fine, upstanding people who populate Peggy Noonan’s World and celebrate her perspective are the ones who hold the most valuable cards at this important table. The “haves” need to admit the “have nots” aren’t being treated equitably, and must prepare themselves to try and do something about it.

Our basic rules of economic engagement are due for a major re-write. That was the sentiment rumbling across the country when the pandemic hit. And it will be waiting there to greet us once this pandemic finally passes through.

Robert J. Cavanaugh, Jr
September 13, 2020

The Smell of Abortion

September 12, 2020 (1,048 words)

Did you know abortion has a smell? This provocative question is posed by one Abby Johnson, who spent eight years working for Planned Parenthood in Bryan, Texas. She started in 2001 by escorting women into the facility from their cars, and eventually became the clinic’s director before ultimately resigning in 2009 as a conscientious objector.

Her decision to jump ship and switch sides has earned her a level of notoriety. Her conversion story is well-known in certain circles, but it remains compelling and bears repeating here:

“For most people who consider themselves pro-life abortion is abstract. They can’t begin to conceive of the barbarity involved. They don’t know about the ‘pieces of children’ room in abortion clinics where infant corpses are pieced back together to ensure nothing remains in the mothers’ womb.

“For me, abortion is real. I know what it sounds like. I know what abortion smells like. Did you know abortion even has a smell?”

One day Johnson was asked to assist in an ultrasound-guided abortion:

“Nothing prepared me for what I saw on the screen: an unborn baby fighting back, desperate to move away from the suction. And I will never forget what the doctor said next. “Beam me up, Scotty.’ The last thing I saw was a spine twirling around in the mother’s womb before succumbing to the force of the suction.

Since leaving Planned Parenthood Ms. Johnson has become an outspoken pro-life advocate who regularly interacts with audiences. Her most recent high-profile speaking gig was at the Republican National Convention a few weeks back. She was part of the Opening Night line-up and received a hero’s welcome.

Her star turn was followed a night later by a Catholic nun of some renown who also enthusiastically testified in defense of the unborn. This much prime-time exposure for their cause positively charmed the pro-life crowd, which came away feeling as though they have finally been brought in from the cold.

Combined with President Trump’s landmark appearance at the March for Life rally last January, everyone should now be convinced beyond a shadow of a doubt the Republican Party is the political party that “stands for life.” There should be no one left out there who needs any further proof the pro-life movement has found its political home.

And yet, here I am.

Listen, Abby Johnson’s story is truly heart-rending. Anyone who can sit through the opening sequence of the feature film Unplanned that is based on her book without sobbing uncontrollably is a better man than me. And the fact the Republican leadership asked her to speak at its convention is a lovely gesture, and a clear indication that it means well.

But in many respects Abby Johnson is an advocate without a home. She is that proverbial ship at sea with nowhere to dock and come ashore. And so is the entire pro-life movement.

In our celebrated liberal democracy, pluralism is our pride and joy. But this makes morality a moving target. Majority rule if often little more than mob rule. The will of the people can change with the weather, and is too easily manipulated. Believing the Christian ethos can triumph in such a setting has proven to be an unrealistic expectation.

Abortion may be the most egregious example of the pitfalls of a liberal democracy, but it’s just the tip of the iceberg. A lot of wrong moves had to be made before we landed on this spot of the game board.

When one lives in a liberal democracy based on pluralism, trying to legislate against an elective medical procedure in not a winning strategy.

In a liberal democracy where everyone gets to do what they want to do, in order to pursue their own, individual definition of happiness, arguing the science that clearly shows life begins at conception will also not work.

The ultimate solution to legal infanticide is much bigger than appointing the right sort of federal judges, defunding Planned Parenthood, and engaging in regional skirmishes over access to abortion.

The challenge before us is figuring out how to reintroduce morality into a system of social organization that has rejected the idea of an objective sense of right and wrong, in favor of the complete emancipation of the individual. And what has the individual been liberated from, exactly? From the limitations imposed by what has been dismissed as nothing more than a social construct. That is to say, from “morality.”

Pro-life people have drawn the mistaken conclusion that reversing laws on abortion is the first step in the much-needed restoration of the culture. While I share their objective, I couldn’t disagree more with their evaluation of the situation.

Right now certain Catholic commentators are caught up in wanting the bishops to call out Joe Biden for his frequent reference to his Catholic upbringing. Mr. Biden, like so many other Catholics in the public eye, started his career as staunchly “pro-life” but has since “developed” his position on the matter to suit the times.

While such a formal rebuke would be welcome, it wouldn’t address the larger issue. The fact that Democrats have lately succumbed to the cultural zeitgeist on matters of sexual morality should in no way obscure the fact that Republicans long ago embraced the cultural zeitgeist on matters of economic immorality.

Concepts such as supply and demand have their place in economic theory. But they should not be allowed to supersede the more fundamental concept of justice. The only problem with our flourishing economic system is that it currently operates outside a moral framework.

Far too many conservative, pro-life Catholics believe that economics has nothing to do with morality, and see abortion as a matter quite apart from the economic question.

Getting bishops to publically condemn politicians who support abortion might be an action sought by some, as a long-awaited defining moment. But that could too easily be misinterpreted as a de-facto endorsement of the Republican Party platform as it pertains to economic behavior.

I, for one, think it’s too much to ask our active bishops to sort through the myriad problems associated with the “economic freedom” promoted by Republicans.

That’s something lay people, and especially our most successful lay people, need to tackle. And they should keep the smell of abortion front and center when they do.

Robert J. Cavanaugh, Jr
September 12, 2020

Reverse Racism at Yale

September 7, 2020 (728 words)

What am i missing? Here we are, smack dab in the middle of a “transformative social justice moment,” with every organization from acting troupes to tech firms loudly proclaiming its support for diversity and inclusion. So now the U.S. Department of Justice is accusing Yale University of “reverse discrimination” in its admissions policies?

Specifically the charge is “Yale discriminates based on race… in its undergraduate admissions process race is the determinate factor in hundreds of admissions decisions each year.”

Furthermore:

“Asian Americans and whites have only one-tenth to one-fourth of the likelihood of admission as African Americans applicants with comparable academic credentials. Yale uses race at multiple steps of its admissions process resulting in a multiplied effect of race on an applicant’s likelihood of admission. Yale racially balances its classes.”

As someone who does not give the Ivy League and its exalted machinations much thought on a typical day, I for one hope that in this instance Yale is guilty as charged. That would mean it has been making a conscious effort to improve the level of diversity and inclusion among its student body, instead of settling for high-minded public pronouncements designed to appease the mood of the moment.

As for the belligerent white majority who finds itself siding with the plaintiffs in the case, and who find admissions (and hiring) quotas distasteful, how exactly do you think we are ever going to improve the level of diversity at our elite institutions?

It’s a tad unrealistic to just sit back and hope hardly any whites or Asian Americans apply in a given year, thereby opening the door to a higher percentage of black students.

It’s hard for me to work up any sympathy for the aggrieved party here, since it’s not as though they are being denied a basic human right. Getting turned away by Yale is not exactly going to automatically condemn anyone to a life of depravation.

Of course, the white and Asian American students with “comparable academic credentials” who are being bumped are probably not the fortunate sons and daughters of alumni. They probably do not come from well-heeled “legacy” families who have helped build Yale’s endowment to a stunning $30 billion – second only to Harvard’s.

No, the students getting passed over are more than likely from families of more modest means, who have only their native intelligence, an aptitude for class work, and an unflinching determination to recommend them. In other words, my people.

Even so there is no cause to shed tears for someone not being admitted to Yale, whatever the reason. There are any number of fine colleges and universities where one can obtain a reliable education. There are bright students and engaged professors everywhere. Sometimes in places where you’d least expect to find them. In no way does one need a degree from Yale to flourish in American society, or pursue one’s ultimate destiny of eternal salvation.

I only hope the previously disadvantaged blacks currently being welcomed will be able to change the tenor of the institution in some meaningful way, instead of merely being absorbed into the existing rarified Yale ethos.

The problem with all big organizations and elite institutions is that those at the top, the ones who make the decisions and determine the agenda, are completely out of touch with the people most affected by those decisions and agendas. This has undermined civility and a sense of unity among the general populace.

We need more folks from the lower ranks of society making their way to the upper echelon. Of course such people will need to be groomed for leadership, which will require the appearance of appropriate mentors along the way. But it’s vitally important they bring their working class sensibilities to their new-and-improved station in life. It is the only way to break down the stratification that has existed since our nation’s founding, and which has only gotten worse over the last half century.

This is why I have such high hopes for someone like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. (Assuming she can manage to win re-election to her House seat in November.) Until recently she earned her living as a waitress. When it comes to steering a future course for our country, I will take a hustling waitress with her wits about her any day over a skull-and-bones child of privilege legal expert who thinks he knows best.

Robert J. Cavanaugh, Jr
September 7, 2020