“Justice on Trial” by Mollie Hemingway and Carrie Severino

In the fall of 2018, few things riveted the attention of Americans like the hearings on the confirmation of Brett Kavanaugh for the U.S. Supreme Court. The story unfolded with the high drama of a suspense novel, with unexpected twists and turns, heroes and villains, and a theme of the utter divisive ruthlessness that pervades American culture. 

Writing from a conservative but balanced perspective, Mollie Hemingway and Carrie Severino tell the story of what happened in Justice on Trial: The Kavanaugh Confirmation and the Future of the Supreme Court. Hemingway, senior editor at The Federalist, and Serevino, chief counsel and policy director for the Judicial Crisis Network, provide an in-depth researched and highly readable account of the nomination, hearings, and eventual confirmation of Judge Kavanaugh.

Mollie Hemingway

The retirement of Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy lit the match. Kennedy was the sharply divided court’s pivot. For some cases, he joined the conservatives; in others, he joined the liberal or progressive justices. Within minutes of his retirement announcement and before the identity of the nominee was known, the battle was underway. 

Hemingway and Serevino provide extensive background on the various main players involved and the precursors to the fight over Kavanaugh, specifically the nominations of Robert Bork and Clarence Thomas. They examine how events unfolded, the role played by abortion, and the underlying mistrust by conservatives and centrist voters over what happens to supposedly conservative judges when they reach the court (or whether they were really conservative in the first place – Harry Blackmun, who wrote the Roe v. Wade opinion, was appointed by Richard Nixon; David Souter by George H.W. Bush; and Anthony Kennedy by Ronald Reagan). 

The Kavanaugh story is one with a lot of moving parts – history, politics, personalities, surprises, and more. The authors manage to keep the parts moving forward and together in a cohesive narrative. They detail the remarkable events that unfolded – The admission by U.S. Sen. Diane Feinstein that she had received the letter accusing Kavanaugh two months before the hearings started but didn’t mention it until it appeared Kavanaugh’s nomination was assured;  the sincerity of Christine Blasey Ford, who accused Kavanaugh of a sexual attack when they were teenagers; the jeremiad of U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham against the Democratic senators on the Judiciary Committee; Brett Kavanaugh’s passionate defense; and the speech by U.S. Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, explaining why she was voting to confirm Kavanaugh.

Carrie Severino

We also see the less-than-remarkable events – attorney Michael Avenatti claiming he was representing a victim of Kavanaugh as well; the woman who claimed she had been attacked, only to backtrack and said she made her statement because she felt “empowered;” the details of the political machines on both sides of the controversy; and the less-than-journalistically-stellar performances by the national news media. 

While they reflect a conservative viewpoint, the authors are surprisingly fair, acknowledging missteps, exaggerations, and blatant lies on both sides. And they raise questions that need to be asked about the role of politics and the court, how court nominations have become weaponized, the role of due process of law, and other subjects important to the functioning of the U.S> government.

To read Justice on Trial is to relive the national trauma of the fall of 2018. It’s a hard story to read, but it goes to the heart of the beliefs and actions that are tearing at the fabric of national life.

The Hiding Place: Endings Are Also Beginnings

I have a friend that I think quite highly of. He’s younger than I am, although not by many years. He’s been through bumps with churches and family, and spent some time in the wilderness. But he is gentle, and kind, with a loving, Christ-like heart.

When the Supreme Court decision on same-sex marriage was handed down in June, my friend went ballistic, but not for the reason you might think. He supported the decision. What he went ballistic over, even before much had been said, was where he thought the evangelical church was going wrong in its reaction. There hadn’t been much time for the evangelical church to do or say anything, but it was his expectation that suddenly turned this kind, gentle, Christ-like heart into a ranting, raving, almost irrational person, filled with anger and venom.

I was stunned. I’m a part of the evangelical church he was ranting against. The decision went the way he wanted it to go, and he was filled with anger at the “side” which seemed to have “lost.” As that “side” responded, his anger increased. I could barely stand to read his words on Facebook. He was spending hour upon hour looking for commentary to attack evangelicals, and, of course, he found it. He almost gleefully posted link after link.

I read each of the stories he linked to, not because I wanted to argue or disagree, but because I tried to understand what my friend’s motivation was. Generally, he posted links to people who were responding much like he was – Christian supporters of the decision who were furious with the evangelical church.

I don’t know what happened to my friend’s loving, kind heart. I believe it’s still there, but right now it's submerged under a sea of anger. I suspect I know what’s going on, but it would not be productive to talk with him right now, and possibly not for some time to come.

So what I do is pray, pray for him, pray that his anger cools, pray that his Christ-like heart resurfaces and the love for which he’s known becomes apparent again.

The court’s decision was both an ending and a beginning, for all of us. In some significant ways, this decision was different from previous watershed decisions, like Roe v. Wade. This one is a game-changer in ways that we can’t fully comprehend yet. The decision wasn’t, or shouldn’t have been, a surprise to anyone.

What lies ahead is the tough work of the church figuring out what to do as a result.

In The Hiding Place, Corrie Ten Boom tells the story of Karel, the young man she fell in love with at age 14. Her love for him, which was eventually returned, lasted until she was 21. And then one day he introduces her to his fiancée, devastating her. His family wanted him to marry well, and he knew that the daughter of a watch shop owner was not the definition of “marrying well.”

What she believed about the relationship turned out to be untrue. She had somewhat deceiving herself, ignoring the signs that something was different, that something was wrong.

In the midst of her devastation, her father gives her some words: “Corrie, do you know what hurts so very much? It’s love. Love is the strongest force in the world, and when it is blocked that means pain. There are two things we can do when this happens. We can kill the love so that it stops hurting. Then of course part of us dies, too. Or we can ask God to open up another route for that love to travel…Whenever we cannot love in the human way, Corrie, God can give us the perfect way.”

And that’s my prayer for me regarding my friend – that God will open up another route for that love to travel.

Led by Jason Stasyszen and Sarah Salter, we’ve been reading and discussing The Hiding Place. For more posts on this chapter, “Karel,” please visit Sarah at LivingBetween the Lines.

Photograph by Jon Luty via Public Domain Pictures. Used with permission.

Born on the 4th of July

I always associate the Fourth of July with beaches. This might likely have to do with the family vacation we took when I was nine years old. My mother was pregnant with my younger brother, and she was feeling so bad that we cancelled our vacation to Pensacola, Florida (four hours by car from where we lived in New Orleans). My older brother and I were disappointed, but she was sick, so what could you do?

And then she rallied. We had lost our reservations, but my father found another hotel, the Congress Inn in Pensacola Beach, with the help of a telephone operator in Pensacola (yes, there used to be real people you dialed for information and phone numbers in distant cities). I can remember standing in the kitchen, probably dancing in nervousness, while he talked with her.

And we were off. It would only be for three days, but that was sufficient.

My mother would spend most of the three days resting in our room. But it was the beach! Sunshine! Sunburns! Seafood! And the fireworks lighting up the night sky on the Fourth of July.

I probably didn’t think too much about the 56 signers of the Declaration of Independence. But I am thinking about them today.

They ranged in age from 26 to 70. Edward Rutledge, a South Carolina lawyer, was 26. The oldest was none other than Benjamin Franklin, age 70. One of the signers, Richard Stockton of New Jersey, later recanted his signature. Eight of the signers had actually been born in Great Britain.

These 56 men (yes, it was all men; that’s how it was in 1776) knew full well they could be signing their death warrants. And they knew they had put everything at risk for what they cared for – family, position, wealth, professions, their everyday lives – everything went into play. But they believed the risk was worth taking, and the alternative was unacceptable.

I am thinking about them today, especially today, a few days after the Supreme Court decision in the Hobby Lobby case. A court divided on ideological lines said Hobby Lobby did not have to pay for employees’ contraceptive services as required under the Affordable Care Act. The next day, the court expanded the decision to apply to six other pending cases.

The reaction was predictable, and indicative of the times we live in. For some time, our politics, and political rhetoric, have been an all-or-nothing proposition. We don’t debate any more, we don’t even argue. We scream past each other. And so it was with the Hobby Lobby decision. And our incessant 24-hour news cycle, with its insatiable demand for news, commentary, speculation, opinion, and rants, helped fuel another opportunity to keep screaming past each other.

Eventually, we’ll learn the real impact of the decision. I suspect it was neither a total triumph of religious liberty nor a total destruction of women’s rights, although that’s what you would have understood from the media coverage. Of course, the media coverage looked tepid compared to what happened on the internet.

We do have a precedent for this kind of polarized rhetoric, where the stakes kept increasing and the screaming kept getting louder. And that is the decade of the 1850s, and what happened after the so-called Compromise of 1850. The polarized screaming finally ended in December, 1860. A few months of relative silence followed, and then came April 12, 1861.

So I think about those 56 men, risking it all, putting everything on the line when they signed a piece of paper together in Philadelphia. And the Fourth of July is not about beaches, barbecues, sunburns and fireworks. Not really.

Illustration: Painting of Fireworks by Lilla Frerichs via Public Domain Pictures. Used with permission.