RNC Chair Steele Attacks Kagan Over Thurgood Marshall Comment

[usregimechange]

According to Kagan Marshall’s vision, is “a thing of glory.”


Republican National Chairman Michael Steele is calling Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan to account for her comments in support of Thurgood Marshall, the first black justice on the nation's highest court.

Steele's statement is attracting plenty of attention from liberal bloggers, who never miss a chance to whack the Republican Party's first black chairman. But Steele's words are also provoking private concern from Republican strategists, who question the wisdom of attacking Kagan for words she wrote praising Marshall after his death in 1993.

Steele's statement, issued minutes after Obama announced his intention to nominate Kagan, said that Senate Republicans need to raise "serious and tough questions" about her legal philosophy. Included in that, Steele said, is "her support for statements suggesting that the Constitution 'as originally drafted and conceived, was "defective."'"

Kagan, a Supreme Court law clerk for Marshall, was extremely familiar with the Baltimore-born jurist's views on the Constitution, which he regarded as a "living document." His liberalism clashed with the ideology of conservative "originalists," such as Justice Antonin Scalia, who say that in rendering decisions on the law of the land they consider the Constitution's meaning and language at the time it was written.

Marshall, addressing the issue at length in a 1987 speech commemorating the bicentennial of the Constitution, used the word "defective" to refer to the government devised by America's 18th century founders. In particular, Marshall discussed the Constitution's deliberate omission of equal rights for women and black slaves. That is the sentiment Steele singled out for criticism in his statement about Kagan.

http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/news/local/politics/2010/05/steele_attacks_kagan_over_thur.html

[leftynyc]

1. The obvious

If it wasn't defective, it wouldn't have needed to be amended 27 times.

[Journeyman]

10. More obvious, its primary defects lead to the Civil War. . .

[NJmaverick]

2. Steele's attacks are no more crazy or out of touch than Greenwald's or Fire Dog Lake's

[disillusioned73]

9. I see you can copy & paste

[usregimechange]

3. Thurgood Marshall's full speech:

http://www.thurgoodmarshall.com/speeches/constitutional_speech.htm

[SpiralHawk]

4. Steeley Mike: "Kagan fails to adequately support Republicon luggage handlers."

"...and she has never uttered a word in support of faux lesbian bondage clubs, or wide-stance diaper sex with hookers. Therefore, no self-disrespecting republicon TeaBagger could possibly, um, back her. And stuff like that."

- Steeley Mike (R - Chickenhawk, of course)
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_FGwroanbS8w/SczFtRpejGI/AAAAAAAABDM/jcJedm270oA/s400/Steele,+Michael+LtGov.jpg

[DevonRex]

5. Does he think the constitution was divinely inspired and therefore perfect

by definition? That argument doesn't even work for the Bible, much less any constitution.

[usregimechange]

6. I need someone with access to Lexis to pull up comments...

Kagan, Texas Law Review of May 1993

[usregimechange]

7. Title: “For Justice Marshall”

[usregimechange]

8. You know, what ever you think about Kagan, this was a dumb comment and political move

plain dumb.

[Winterblues]

12. Yep telling the truth is very dumb indeed.

The US constitution was indeed quite flawed and heaven forbid some in Power brought attention to that fact..

[usregimechange]

14. This is a reason to support Kagan and Marshall

[Journeyman]

11. But that was the intent of Mr Lincoln's remarks at Gettysburg, to remake the nation. . .

and place it on the footing of the Declaration's call for equality, instead of the Constitution's muddled legalistic gyrations of partial people and commerce in property over personal freedom.

[onehandle]

13. Shut up and wait for your failure of a term to expire. nt