Justice Alito Assured Senator Ted Kennedy That He Would Not Overturn Roe v. Wade

Posted on by under History, Law and justice, Political commentary, Racism & Bigotry, Re-blogs

It’s one thing to acknowledge that politicians will tell lies to get elected to office. We may not like it, and some tell small lies while others tell whoppers, but most people accept that there are some lies told by politicians. However, Supreme Court justices are NOT politicians, do not stand for election but rather are appointed for life, and thus we should be able to hold them to a higher standard. To say that today’s Court is a disappointment would be an understatement. Read what Diane Ravitch shows us about the lack of integrity of one Justice Samuel Alito.

Diane Ravitch's blog

The New York Times reported that Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito assured Senator Ted Kennedy that he would not overturn Roe v. Wade. He said repeatedly that he respects precedent and considered Roe to be settled law. Seventeen years later, Justice Alito wrote the scathing opinion overturning Roe v. Wade and asserting that it was wrong from the start.

How should Americans react when they learn that at least three of the 6 justices who voted to overturn Roe are liars?

Senator Edward M. Kennedy looked skeptically at the federal judge. It was Nov. 15, 2005, and Samuel A. Alito Jr., who was seeking Senate confirmation for his nomination to the Supreme Court, had just assured Mr. Kennedy in a meeting in his Senate office that he respected the legal precedent of Roe v. Wade, the 1973 court decision that legalized abortion.

“I am a believer in precedents,” Judge Alito…

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47 thoughts on “Justice Alito Assured Senator Ted Kennedy That He Would Not Overturn Roe v. Wade”

    • Well, as I just told Polly, the initial intent of giving Supreme Court Justices lifetime tenure was to keep them non-partisan … the framers of the Constitution realized that if a Justice had to be re-appointed, or worse yet elected, periodically, they would be inclined to make partisan decisions in order to boost their own image. Sadly, in recent decades, the Justices have become far more partisan than was ever intended.

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      • Yes Jill, the politics around the world has in some ways emulated the Trump politics of lies and aggression. Your founding fathers could never have envisioned so many idiots could actually exist. Your system of democracy is seriously broken.

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  2. Justices are politicians too & politicians say what’s expedient at the time (some call that lying) for whatever reason they may have at that moment.

    As for holding them to a “higher standard”, please please please get real already. There are no higher standards. People are people, whether they are politicians or priests or prostitutes on the street. They do what they have to do at the time they have to do it. They say what they have to say when they have to say it.

    Politics now are no different than politics in the time of Julius Caesar or Charlemagne or Elizabeth I or Lincoln or FDR. We may think they’re different because of TV, the internet, blogging, TikTok, whatever. But they’re no different & politicians are no different.

    Stop asking our politicians to adhere to some mythical higher standard. Accept them for who they are & either vote for them or don’t vote for them. If you don’t like what they are saying, then don’t vote for them. It’s that simple.

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    • The reason Justices are appointed for life is so that they will NOT become politicians! That was the entire purpose … so they would not have to give in to partisan whims in order to seek another term. So … if they are politicians as you say, then they are in violation of the U.S. Constitution and should promptly be impeached.

      I still believe that there ARE higher standards. Some of us have values and live by those values … it’s called integrity. Others choose not to … and therefore succumb to lower standards. Can you honestly tell me that everyone in the world is a corrupt asshole? I am a realist, Polly, but I also see good in some people that perhaps you aren’t seeing. I see some politicians who actually care about the people of this country and will do what’s in their power to make this a better nation … not a ‘great’ one as Trump proclaims, but a better one than it is today.

      You are far more cynical than I am, and I thought I had become too cynical! 🤣

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      • Well, justices are appointed for life so that they do not have partisan leanings; obviously with this court that’s a JOKE! but that’s not what being a politician is all about. I would wager that it would require a person to be a politician of the highest order, to judge cases & deal with people WITHOUT letting one’s personal political leanings color your judicial rulings.

        I AM cynical but I’m also realistic. I’m not one of those positive people who think everything is going to be OK but I’m not a negative person, either. I try not to get too upset about anything nowadays, especially politics.

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        • True … with the current composition of the Court, it is a joke. It worked (mostly) for a long time, but then along came Trump who appointed Justices who swore an oath of fealty to him, rather than to the Constitution, and here we are today with Kavanaugh, Gorsuch, and Barrett, not to mention the highly contestable Clarence Thomas whose wife participated in the events of January 6th! An open attempted coup … and still he sits up there on his damned throne breaking our trust! You’re right, it takes a person of great character to rule according to law, according to the Constitution, without letting their own beliefs get in the way, but this crew ain’t even trying! Many in the past have been able to do it for the good of the nation, but the good of the nation is not in these people’s playbooks.

          Like you, Polly, I’m not one who thinks everything will come out fine at the end of the day … you’ve read my blog long enough to know that. However, I also believe that if we all do our duty, IF we care more about the future of the nation, about the future of life on the planet, and act accordingly, then there is hope for a brighter future than what we see today. If we completely lose hope, then … what’s the use in trying, right? And if we stop trying … then we hand the keys to the ‘bad guys’, the ‘other side’, and … enter the darkness.

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    • I actually believe the politics has changed much for the worst. I do agree humans will be humans and push their ideological crap. I do however remember politicians had a certain level of respect for each other that they rarely stepped over. Most had a moral sense of duty and they often owned up to mistakes or resigned. The social media has greatly misguided most of public thinking on all issues and it has allowed the situation for politicians to become less political and more radical with their personal views, being able to lie and even break the law and then deny it regardless of the truth realising they are becoming far more popular and often a hero through misinformed social media.

      Of course the politicians I knew while growing up were in New Zealand and it is difficult to compare them to the behaviour of US and European governments. Our National\Liberal Australian government was very Trump like, plenty of lies within its own ranks and to the public, fortunately they have now been voted out.

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      • I don’t think it’s social media aka Facebook, Twitter, etc. There has always been some form of social media. In Rome, it was graffiti, in the Renaissance, it was the placard (helped to bring down Mary Queen of Scots, for example), in the 1700s, it was the pamphlet, in the 1920s & 30s, it was the radio. It’s always been something & there’s always something for people to blame. The fact is, politics is a blood sport & it’s not for the weak. If you are going to be a political person, you have to be strong & tough & have a very thick skin. Most people are not like this. They are too “nice” for politics & the comments on most blogs show this.

        If you have ever played chess, you know that you have to be always thinking ahead, thinking about what your opponent is going to do next, not just the very next move, but several moves ahead & be planning your moves accordingly. You are playing to win. You are not playing to be nice. This is what politics is like.

        I agree that politics in the US (especially with the GOP) has gone off the rails but we are not the only nation in the world where this is happening. We just have a particularly American version of this madness.

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        • Honestly Silver, you cannot compare the mass saturation of propaganda we have today with printed media, radio or even TV. The public such as 240 million in 2020 in the US, meaning 72.3% of Americans are active on social media and are being indoctrinated by people who are determined to spread lies and falsehoods to the millions they know will be sucked in within a very short time. Similar to fraud, internet fraud is rampant along with hackers and crooks world wide, it spreads like a plague, it just really highlights how many people are easily manipulated in beliefs and parting with their information and cash. Religions have had the oil on this for thousands of years.

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  3. I did not leave a comment on Ms Ravitch’s post. Some commenters there did not sound genuine. Justice Alito might have genuinely meant what he told Senator Kennedy, at the time and in the moment, but Alito is definitely not a man of consistency. What he beiueves todsy he may not believe tomorrow. When his granddaughter, or great-granddaaughter needs an abortion he will declare he was mistaken about Roe. But by then, it will be too late. And he won’t feel at all guilty if she dies in childbirth because she could not get an abortion. That was not him who wrote the ruling, that was a different Alito altogether.

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    • You give Alito far more credit than I do, but I suppose you’re right that he might have changed his mind since 2006 when he said Roe was established law. Still … I think it was a low move and I’ve lost any respect for him.

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      • I am not trying to defend him, but people have to be allowed to change, even when we do not agree w8th the changes.Otherwise we would be children all our lives — which may not be a bad idea in certain circumstances

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        • Changing your mind is one thing. People evolve, they learn, new ideas and knowledge might help shape their views … but changing your basic ideology is something else altogether. People don’t change WHO they are. Sure, I might decide I like or support some things that I once didn’t, but my core values remain the same.

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          • There I have to disagree. I have changed my core beliefs over time, once I discovered I had them. I did not like myself growing up, but I put up with me because I thought that was who I was supposed to be.
            Then I discovered I had choices, and I could remake myself into a person I could love. And I thnk this is a discovery most Republicans never make, unless they really enjoy hating on everyone else, including themselves.
            I love being me now, and I wish everyone in the world could love being themselves. It seems so few people do.

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            • My first memory of life comes from my 3rd birthday and all I remember was a yellow tablecloth. But the first in a stream of cognitive memories comes from when I was 5 years old and began asking questions. From that time, I have never changed my core beliefs, that people’s skin colour makes no difference, that there is no magnificent superior being in charge of the universe, that kindness is the right thing. Perhaps that makes me an anomaly, but it is the truth. Oh sure, there are times I do or say things that later make me ashamed … I am, after all, human and therefore flawed. But my basic beliefs in right and wrong have not changed in nearly 70 years and I don’t expect they will now. But then, you and I are two different people with different life’s experiences, yes?

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