‘We’re supposed to keep our mouths shut while the party establishment opens borders…’
(Joshua Paladino, Liberty Headlines) In comments about the Supreme Court‘s Bostock decision, Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., said establishment Republicans have given religious conservatives a “bad bargain,” and it’s time to reject it.
“The bargain is that you go along with the party establishment, you support their policies and priorities, or at least keep your mouth shut about it, and in return the establishment will put some judges on the bench who, supposedly, will protect your Constitutional right to freedom of worship,” Hawley said.
The Supreme Court ruled Monday in a 6-3 decision, with the support of two Republican-appointed judges, that civil rights law must protect homosexual and transsexual persons, even though Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act does not mention these people.
Hawley said originalist and textualist judges, who say they base their decisions on the intent and meaning of legislation, have failed religious conservatives.
“This decision, this Bostock case and the majority who wrote it, it represents the end of something,” Hawley said. “It represents the end of the conservative legal movement or the conservative legal project as we know it.”
Establishment Republicans made Hawley’s case for him as they praised the Supreme Court’s decision in Bostock v. Clayton County.
Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, praised Justice Neil Gorsuch as “a good judge,” CNN reported.
“They interpreted our statute and I’m OK with it,” he said.
Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., said Gorsuch’s opinion showed his “independence.”
“The country has obviously changed a lot on that issue, “he said. “I assume he looked at the facts and the law and he came to that conclusion. When we nominated and confirmed him, that’s what we wanted him to do.”
Sens. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., Rob Portman, R-Ohio, and Deb. Fischer, R-Neb., all said they accepted the Supreme Court’s ruling.
Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, said he supported the content of the decision even though it should have been “reached by Congress rather than the court.”
Hawley said on the Senate floor that Supreme Court judges, even those who call themselves textualists, determine the meaning of the laws they interpret based on their preferred outcome, and in doing this they act as legislators, not judges.
“To me, the principle of textualism, which is rooted in the separation of powers, is that the courts are bound by the meaning of the words at the time they are written, and any updating ought to be done by Congress,” he said.
In other words, when Congress passed the Civil Rights Act in 1964, the rights of people who identify as LGBTQIA+ were not in consideration, so the Supreme Court had to superimpose a contemporary understanding of the legislation’s language.
“This piece of legislation changes the scope of the 1964 Civil Rights Act.” Hawley said. “It changes the meaning of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. It changes the text of the 1964 Civil Rights Act.”
Hawley also used his speech on the Senate floor to criticize the Republican Party establishment for its internationalist, corporate, and bureacratic approach to economic, social, and religious issues.
“We were told that we were supposed to shut up while the party establishment focuses more on cutting taxes and handing out favors for corporations, multinational corporations who don’t share our values, who will not stand up for American principles, who are only too happy to ship American jobs overseas,” he said.
“We’re supposed to keep our mouths shut while the party establishment opens borders, while the party establishment pursues ruinous trade policies,” he said.