Sen. Jeff Sessions, a Senate Judiciary Committee subcommittee chairman and former prosecutor, warned that liberal judge appointments to the Supreme Court by a President Hillary Rodham Clinton will end constitutional law.
With a fifth liberal making a Democratic majority on the court, Sessions warned in an interview, “This will be the end of law in America.”
He predicted that giving Democrats a majority will result in an explosion of liberal legal changes driven by two new members appointed by President Obama, Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor.
“We’ll have Kagan and Sotomayor on steroids and more,” said Sessions.
“They believe they have the power to redefine the meaning of words from plain meaning, plain historical understandings, and make them say what they want so they can advance their agenda which is a direct attack on the American people to set the agenda,” said Sessions.
He sought to remind the public that justices are appointed for live and are not accountable for their decisions.
“It’s a very risky thing,” said the senator. “I’m just amazed how far we’ve gotten away from the fundamental principle of the law that words should be given the fair meaning as they were intended. Once that happens there is no order.”
Liberals have been pushing the Republican majority on the Senate Judiciary Committee to being hearings on the justice Obama has picked to replace the late Antonin Scalia. Republicans, however, have rejected moving on the nomination of Merrick Garland.
In a speech to the National Realtors Association on Wednesday, Garland received an endorsement from influential journalist Bob Woodward. He called Garland “somebody who should be on the court.”
And among the reasons: It would produce a “liberal lock” on the court.
“He’s kind of in the center of the liberal lock. Well think about it then, if Garland replaced Scalia, you would have a liberal lock of five justices, which would be a majority,” he said.
Sessions slapped that down and said the court’s direction will be a huge issue in the fall election.
“There will be no clearer issue in the campaign than that one. And in my view consistently the American people prefer the Republican view of judges, that they are well aware that judges helped create the crime wave in the 70s,” said the Alabama senator.
Paul Bedard, the Washington Examiner’s “Washington Secrets” columnist, can be contacted at [email protected]
