As first reported by Right Wing Watch, Justice Antonin Scalia is set to lecture about the Constitution for the opening class of Rep. Michele Bachmann’s new Constitutional Conservative Caucus. Bachmann, a favorite of Tea Party and Religious Right groups alike, hopes to promote to her peers her far-right and fringe perspective on the Constitution. For example, Bachmann bizarrely rejects the notion of “negative rights” as “infantilism,” even though negative rights are the basis of constitutionally protected non-interference, such as freedom of speech or the freedom from slavery.
But for Bachmann’s Tea Party-inspired caucus, the language and spirit of the Constitution is altered and manipulated to fit their ultraconservative outlook on the country.
On Saturday, the New York Times called on Justice Scalia to bow out from his class for Bachmann’s group in order to maintain the independence of the Supreme Court and to avoid lending credence to the Tea Party’s radical approach to the Constitution:
The Tea Party epitomizes the kind of organization no justice should speak to — left, right or center — in the kind of seminar that has been described in the press. It has a well-known and extreme point of view about the Constitution and about cases and issues that will be decided by the Supreme Court.
By meeting behind closed doors, as is planned, and by presiding over a seminar, implying give and take, the justice would give the impression that he was joining the throng — confirming his new moniker as the “Justice from the Tea Party.” The ideological nature of the group and the seminar would eclipse the justice’s independence and leave him looking rash and biased.
There is nothing like the Tea Party on the left, but if there were and one of the more liberal justices accepted a similar invitation from it, that would be just as bad. This is not about who appointed the justice or which way the justice votes. Independence and the perception of being independent are essential for every justice.
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By presiding over this seminar, Justice Scalia would provide strong reasons to doubt his impartiality when he ruled later on any topic discussed there. He can best convey his commitment to the importance of his independence, and the court’s, by deciding it would be best not to attend.
Just as Bachmann’s caucus won’t include balanced perspectives on the Constitution, there is nothing apolitical about Bachmann’s caucus either. Other lecturers for Bachmann’s group include right wing Fox News commentators Sean Hannity and Andrew Napolitano. She is also organizing a lecture by pseudo-historian David Barton, a Republican Party activist who has no training or expertise in history but publicizes the belief that the Framers intended to create a Constitution that reflected Biblical law.
Bachmann recently floated conspiracy theories about the Census and AmeriCorps, which she likened to reeducation camps, and demanded investigations of “people in Congress and find out, are they pro-America or anti-America?” But with increased influence in the House GOP and help from Justice Scalia, Bachmann and her radical ideas will have more power as Republicans hold the majority in the House next session.