Whether He Stays or Goes, a Reputation and a Legacy Are Destroyed

Confidence in the fairness of our legal systems must not only be maintained, but it must be perceived to be maintained. Unfortunately, we are way beyond that perception in the circumstances surrounding Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. Personally, his remaining on the bench or leaving no longer matters.

But institutionally, what becomes of him matters a great deal

Currently, a mere 25% of Americans have a great deal (or even fair amount) of confidence in the U.S. Supreme Court and that has little to do with Thomas, because it’s been declining for decades now, a trend that began in 1973. The prior low was 30% in 2014 from a high point of 56% in 1998. Interestingly, when I Googled ‘highest ever public support of Supreme Court,’ I found pages and pages of how that support went to hell, but nothing at all on its pinnacle of power.

A dismal showing for the nation’s highest court

Thomas was a particularly contentious nominee prior to his being seated on the court in 1991, accused of sexual harassment allegations by Anita Hill, a law professor who had previously worked for him. A media frenzy accompanied his confirmation hearings, which he rode out to prevail, even though he had served only a prior eight months as a judge at any level. Once seated, he asked not a single question in ten years, yet voted consistently with conservative judges.

It seems the high court consistently misjudged the public heart and Clarence Thomas is simply a sad example

To name just a few, 1) the nation wanted gun control and the court supported guns, no matter the endless (and increasing) mass killings. 2) Americans overwhelmingly support a woman’s right to choose and yet the court allowed states to outlaw abortions. 3) We want extended voter access and they gutted the Voting Rights Act of 1965, freeing Southern states from federal oversight of their election laws, allowing gerrymandering and restrictive voter access in poor neighborhoods. 4) America wants money out of politics and the Roberts Court, in Citizens United held that political donations are speech protected by the First Amendment, opening the floodgates to unlimited personal and corporate donations to Super PACs. It’s hardly free speech since that decision.

And then there’s Exxon. Both God and The Supremes love the oil companies

5) Following the Exxon Valdez oil spill, one of the greatest environmental disasters of the time, and after years and years of litigation, Exxon was finally held responsible for its negligent captain and hit with $5 billion in damages. But the Supreme Court ruled that Exxon couldn't be subject to punitive damages in excess of compensatory ones. Anyone know how they came up with that? It dropped total damages by 90%, down to $500 million. Not only did Exxon evade billions in damages, the Supreme Court's ruling increased the value of its stock by $23 billion in two days.

I guess that’s enough to at least suggest that the Supreme Court is out of touch with American values as understood by its citizens.

We are a pissed off nation, which makes us vulnerable

Our jobs and most of what once supported a vibrant American middle class has been shipped off to China. Too many of our kids are living in their old upstairs bedrooms because they put themselves in lifelong debt for a college education and can’t find work. The U.S. Congress can’t find its ass with both hands and our presidential candidates are both likely to be old white men who wish the world was other than what it is. Artificial intelligence is at the doorstep and our leadership hasn’t yet mastered the concept of the oceans rising.

This is certainly not Clarence Thomas’s fault, but he is a metaphor for shit that hits the fan

Clarence doesn’t give a damn and we desperately need people at (or near) the top who give a damn. I don’t personally care that he hasn’t a clue about propriety and what it means to sit in judgement of his fellow citizens at the very top of the judicial pile, while shitting the bed. It doesn’t affect my social security check a single dollar, at least for now.

But I care very much that a man who is charged with the duties of a public servant—a man who judges you and me, gazing down in that lifetime robe he wears—holds himself outside the moral values of a nation thirsting for morality. Please God (if there is a god), send us someone, one single person in a position of power, who doesn’t pile all the food at the table on his own plate.

I’ll settle for that. Maybe later I’ll want more from my country but, at the moment, I’ll settle for that.

Maybe you will too.