DOJ must provide justice for justices

Editorials
DOJ must provide justice for justices
Editorials
DOJ must provide justice for justices
Supreme Court Kavanaugh
Protesters gather outside the home of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, Monday, Sept. 13, 2021, in Chevy Chase, Md., after a high-profile decision earlier this month in which the court by 5-4 vote declined to step in to stop a Texas law banning most abortions from going into effect, prompting outrage from abortion rights groups and President Joe Biden. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)

Leftist demonstrators are again targeting the homes of Supreme Court justices, and again Attorney General Merrick Garland won’t enforce the law to protect the judicial process from intimidation.

Admirably, four Republican senators are demanding that Garland do his job. Failure to comply should disqualify Garland from office.


GET READY FOR ILLEGAL BIDEN BONDS

The right of free speech has never extended to the right to harass. And while speech rights are broadest when they involve the political process, they are arguably weakest when intended to affect the impartial administration of justice, which is meant as an entirely apolitical enterprise. This is why federal law 18 USC 1507 makes it illegal to, “with the intent of influencing any judge … picket or parade [in or near] a residence occupied” by a judge. Note that this law, like laws regarding jury tampering and similar conduct, has been adjudged entirely constitutional and not in conflict with the First Amendment.

Leftist activists have ignored this law for the past 18 months or so, sporadically but at times quite vociferously, in an effort to pressure the justices about abortion and other areas facing the Supreme Court. They have even done so at the home of Justice Amy Coney Barrett, who has young children. Separate from the protests, several justices have been targeted with death threats. Justice Brett Kavanaugh was the target of major harassment at a restaurant and, most frighteningly, an aborted assassination attempt by a man outside his house. Kavanaugh, it should be noted, had two minor daughters at home.

When numerous Republican officials complained that the Justice Department wasn’t enforcing the law, Garland tried to pawn off the decision on local marshals who, he said, had discretionary authority to determine whether arrests were warranted. But at a March 28 hearing, Sen. Katie Britt (R-AL) showed that Garland had been untruthful in his answers. She produced slides, provided by a whistleblower, that had been used to prepare federal marshals for their duty outside the justices’ homes. The training materials “actively discouraged” the marshals from making arrests, even if the protests are “rude, provocative, insulting, disrespectful, loud, critical, dismissive, and offensive.”

Garland, feigning ignorance, promised Britt he would look into this improper training. Six weeks later, Garland hasn’t reported back. Now, protesters are back again at the justices’ homes, with still no arrests being made.

On May 3, Britt, along with Sens. Mike Lee (R-UT), Tom Cotton (R-AR), and Ted Cruz (R-TX), sent
a new, hard-hitting letter to Garland. They noted not only Garland’s own misleading testimony but also an abundance of other evidence that top Justice Department officials had given incorrect testimony to Congress, even as the department was discouraging marshals from making arrests. The senators insist on a full accounting of, records about, and email communications concerning these improper instructions to the marshals. And they demand that Garland tell them if he has followed up on his promise to Britt to investigate the situation while directing him to share his findings with the Senate.

The senators are right to be concerned — indeed, to be furious. Again and again, Garland’s Justice Department throws the book at conservative activists or even invents charges to file against entirely innocent people on the opposition. Yet when liberals directly and repeatedly flout the law while pressuring and threatening justices, Garland’s minions refuse to enforce the law.

Politicized justice is no justice at all. A cover-up of politicized injustice is a form of corruption against the constitutional system and the public good. If Garland won’t enforce the law, and if he countenances untruths to Congress to hide the same, he should return to private citizenship and be subject himself to honest law enforcement.


CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER

Share your thoughts with friends.

Related Content