After last summer’s ruling on abortion, attacks on the Supreme Court were inevitable. The majority decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health––that there is no constitutional right to abortion––broke with a long-standing precedent that a majority of the public supported while taking away a right that tens of millions valued, factors that stoked a backlash as significant as any the Court had seen in decades.
What’s striking and harder to understand is the similarly furious backlash to the Supreme Court’s most recent term, which began in October 2022 and culminated in rulings announced this summer. That term encompasses 60 cases in total. The nonpartisan National Constitution Center flagged 13 of those cases as significant. Taken together, they show a Court that is broadly in step with public opinion and whose justices form shifting coalitions across ideological lines.
Maybe both backlashes stemmed from the same cause.
UPDATE: From the comments: “Glenn, the histrionic attacks on the US Supreme Court are coming from the Democrat senators on Senate Judiciary Committee and their looney-tune staff. The histrionics are coming from those who complained about the lack of decorum exhibited by Donald Trump.”