Jewish groups reacted immediately following the U.S. Senate confirmation on Monday of Amy Coney Barrett as the 115th U.S. Supreme Court justice a week before the Nov. 3 election.
Barrett, previously a judge on the U.S. Seventh Circuit Court and a professor at Notre Dame Law School, her law school alma mater, was confirmed 52-48. All but one Republican, Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), voted in favor of her nomination, while all Democrats voted against it.
She succeeds the late Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a heralded liberal judicial, feminist and Jewish icon who was the second woman to serve on the nation’s highest court. Ginsburg died on Sept. 18 at the age of 87 from “complications of metastatic pancreas cancer,” according to a statement from the Supreme Court shortly after her death.
In her opening statement on Oct. 12 in front of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, Barrett paid tribute to Ginsburg.
“When I was 21 years old and just beginning my career, Ruth Bader Ginsburg sat in this seat. She told the Committee, ‘What has become of me could only happen in America,’ ” she said. “I have been nominated to fill Justice Ginsburg’s seat, but no one will ever take her place. I will be forever grateful for the path she marked and the life she led.”
The Republican Jewish Coalition welcomed her confirmation.
“Amy Coney Barrett is highly qualified, fair-minded and dedicated to the law,” said RJC chairman and former Sen. Norm Coleman (R-Minn.). “President Donald Trump made a wise choice in nominating her, and we are pleased that the Senate moved swiftly to confirm her to the court.”
“Having a full complement of nine justices on the Supreme Court is very important to the smooth and effective working of our constitutional system,” he continued. “The president and the Senate appropriately carried out their duties in putting forward and confirming this nominee.”
The Jewish Coalition for Religious Liberty and its general counsel, Howard Slugh, applauded the confirmation of Barrett.
“This year, the Supreme Court will hear cases that could have a substantial impact on Americans’ religious liberty,” JCRL and Slugh told JNS. “We hope that Justice Barrett brings to those cases the same dedication to the Constitution that she has exhibited in her legal writings, time on the 7th Circuit and at her confirmation hearings.”
Rabbi Aryeh Spero, president of the Conference of Jewish Affairs, told JNS that Barrett’s jurisprudence is to be lauded.
“I approach the Constitution as I do the Torah, as an Originalist. Decisions should be based on and then applied based on the original intent and meaning of the text,” he said. “Both are here to inform and shape our views and decisions, not overlooked and stretched in favor of a particular political agenda or used as a convenient expedient toward pre-determined outcomes.”
Rabbi Dov Fischer, western regional vice president of the Coalition for Jewish Values, told JNS that Barrett “is an exceptionally qualified jurist with a family commitment, lifestyle and value system that should inspire all Americans. Barrett is quite worthy of a seat on the United States Supreme Court.”
‘Cynically clinging to power’
The Jewish Democratic Council of America, Democratic Majority for Israel and Bend the Arc: Jewish Action objected to her confirmation, as have Democrats in the U.S. Congress.
“Jewish Dems see the confirmation of Amy Coney Barrett for what it is—a partisan power grab by President Trump and Senate Republicans, which violates the will of the American people, Justice Ginsburg’s dying wish and the standard Republicans set themselves for Supreme Court nominations in a presidential election year,” said JDCA executive director Halie Soifer in a statement. “This confirmation will impact generations of Americans, and it’s a shande—a shame to our democracy and judiciary.”
“Judge Barrett has demonstrated a total disregard for legal precedent on critical issues such as the Affordable Care Act, equality in marriage and reproductive freedom, and her views on the law are far outside the mainstream of public opinion,” continued Soifer. “She has also refused to commit to recusing herself from cases involving an election dispute and may serve as the swing vote on the Court deciding the outcome of our presidential election.”
DMFI president and CEO Mark Mellman told JNS, “With the confirmation of Judge Barrett, President Trump and Republicans come ever closer to achieving their long-desired goals for the Supreme Court: eliminating the Affordable Care Act and its protections for those with preexisting conditions; overturning Roe v. Wade and outlawing all abortions; and undermining democracy by deciding Trump is ‘re-elected,’ regardless of how Americans vote.”
Bend the Arc: Jewish Action Stosh Cotler told JNS, “Amy Coney Barrett’s confirmation represents the culmination of the years-long effort of President Trump and Republican senators to stack our courts with ideologues who are only interested in protecting the rights of people who look and think like them.”
“The GOP Senate that confirmed Barrett actually represents a minority of Americans, and five of the nine current Supreme Court justices have now been appointed by presidents who lost the popular vote,” she continued. “This type of minority rule is fundamentally undemocratic and goes against every ideal our government supposedly stands for.”
Cotler also said, “The rights of millions of women, immigrants, LGBTQ people and people of color are threatened by a Supreme Court that cannot be trusted. The deeply hypocritical actions of Trump and the Republican Senate have nothing to do with guaranteeing equal justice under law, and everything to do with cynically clinging to power.”
Certain Jewish organizations, including the Orthodox Union, the Rabbinical Assembly, the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, National Council of Young Israel, B’nai B’rith International, Women’s League for Conservative Judaism, declined to comment.
{JNS}
{Matzav.com}
We religious Jews of course are beyond thrilled that ACB was confirmed, and without a major battle from the left, too. We are not, however, appreciative of the above Rabbi’s comment likening the Holy Torah to the US Constitution. We as cognizant Jews reflexively say “l’havdil” when making such an analogy, and since it was obviously not appropriate to say that in the given context, the entire analogy should have been omitted (it was not a necessary part of his remarks, after all).
The Liberal leftist “Jewish” organizations who protested the confirmation are very foolish, since it surely is in a value-driven society’s best interests to have a conservative judiciary, so as to keep the anti-moral anti-individual-freedom socialists at bay. Their argument that the Republican Senate is “hypocritical” is very shallow at best, since the Republican Senate doesn’t have a “policy” about when to and when to not confirm a judge; they merely have the same “policy” the Democrats have, which is to legally act in their own and their constituency’s best interests. When Obama wanted to put a severe liberal on the court, they legally used their power to stop him (thank G-d!), and now when Trump wanted to put a serious right-leaning judge on the court, they legally used their power to get it done.
It probably would have been better for the Jews if this article said more about the support we offer to ACB than the retractors’ opinions, and not the other way around. While it’s true that we live in a “free country” where all opinions can be shouted from the rooftops, we still must recognize that we don’t curry favor with the conservative judiciary when we display our animosity, and that could hurt us as American Jews down the road.
What’s Jewish about these people? That they say ‘shande’ and eat gefilte fish?! The real shande is that they are condemning a justice who is opposed to federally sanctioned toieva and abortion in the name of Judaism. That is beyond a shande, it’s a חלול השם נורא.
most members of these movements are not jewish as they keep on shedding and changing the torah to comform to their taves. the greatest churbin that renders them gentiles is thier passing the ‘law’ that ‘paternal decent’ is also jewish.
Now, i am no insulting anyone. There is nothing wrong with being MUSLIM, CHRISTIAN, ETC but dont pass yourself off as Jewish.
you cannot play a softball with 5 players and throw it in a loop on basketball court and say it is baseball game