In just four years, the Trump Presidency has selected two highly controversial Supreme Court nominations, and it is looking more and more like his second nominee, Amy Coney Barrett, will be confirmed and become a member of the Supreme Court. Thankfully, Barrett does not have any allegations of sexual assault, a rarity in today’s politics, but she does have her fair share of sources of controversy.
When taking a look at her past, it’s easy to like Barrett. She has seven children, two of whom are adopted from Haiti. She is a woman of faith, and she has done extensive work as a judge and a professor, and her students at Notre Dame say she is a great professor who never brought politics into the classroom. It is also refreshing to see a woman rise so easily to power in a career field dominated by men. However, do not expect the rights of women to advance at all should Barrett be confirmed.
Barrett would overturn Roe v. Wade if given the chance, and organizations like Planned Parenthood would be weakened even further than they already have been. Although Americans have little say in the process of picking Supreme Court Justices, the process certainly impacts the American people. To overturn Roe v. Wade would be a significant step backwards, and it would not accomplish the conservative goal of putting an end to abortions. Women would not stop having abortions, they would simply have illegal abortions, but conservatives don’t care. While their message is that they want to save lives, they disregard the millions of children in foster care, the women who will die from dangerous abortions, and so many other lives in the process. This disregard shows that their agenda is not truly about life at all, it is about controlling women’s bodies. If Barrett will not stand up against the control of women’s bodies by the government, what will she stand up for?
One thing Barrett certainly advocates is marriage between a man and a woman, and a man and a woman only. It is fair to assume that given the chance, she would undermine LGBTQ rights, and expand religious freedom to discriminate against LGBTQ people. In our legal system, it is perfectly fine to believe in one’s religion that marriage is between a man and a woman, or a woman and a woman, or whatever else your religious text may say. However, personal beliefs are just that, personal. It is fundamental to our Constitution that religion and state remain separate, and as an originalist interpreter of the Constitution, Barrett should be more than familiar with the concept. However, despite her familiarity, the rulings she has made as an appellate judge and will make on the Supreme Court reflect her religion nonetheless.
The United States is not an anti-religious country, but we are, or at least claim to be, a country without an official religion. While it is okay for Supreme Court justices to have religious beliefs, it is unconstitutional for their religious views to leak into our legislature. Americans can expect to see a wave of religiously-driven decisions made by the Supreme Court in the future. Gay marriage, the right to choose, and many other landmark decisions could be impacted or even overturned under this new vehemently conservative Supreme Court. While Amy Coney Barrett might be a nice woman and an abundantly qualified candidate, she will leave a lasting impact on America, and it won’t be a good one.
