Was the late Justice Antonin Scalia a bigot?

[knapplc]

Simple up or down vote.

[84HuskerLaw]

Assinine question. Obviously you don't know anything about the man.

[knapplc]

I would presume that someone who knows enough about Scalia to know that this is an "assinine" (sic) question would be able to educate those of us who vote yes. Please, educate us. How was he not a bigot?

[knapplc]

No, we all aren't. Don't confuse bias with bigotry.

[Saunders]

I deleted my reply, my bad, I'm out.

[Danny Bateman]

Abstaining from the vote, because I'm too young to know anything of Scalia's legacy, but regardless, in for some education. Very interested to learn what people think of him.

 

[zoogs]

One could argue that clever, capable judges will make the best legal arguments within their considerable power to protect whatever vision of America they personally prefer. I don't believe Scalia was much different. The legal merits of his positions notwithstanding, his personal views were, in my opinion, abundantly clear.

 

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/OTUS/justice-antonin-scalias-provocative-comments-gay-issues/story?id=18791020

 

In 1996, Scalia dissented against the USSC ruling that individual states had the right to ban discriminatory practices against gay people. He would later of course trumpet the idea that states should be left alone to ban homosexual conduct if they so chose, when the Court struck down Texas sodomy law in 2003.

 

In that 2003 case, he made impassioned arguments defending wistfully the 'rights' of many Americans who do not want gay people as business partners or schoolteachers.

 

In 2013, he was furious when the Court struck down the provision of DOMA that prevented federal recognition of state-approved same sex marriages. He ridiculed the notion that this section of DOMA constituted 'desire to harm' couuples in same-sex marriages, and was particularly bent out of shape by the idea that this interpretation would lead to the (indeed now prevalent) view that state-laws denying gay marriage were also harmfully intended.

 

I'm sure he was an eminent scholar with many redeeming things about his character. And really, we all live in a time where we have to empathize with the reluctance or plain inability of millions of people in America or elsewhere to come to personal grips with gay people.

 

It strains credulity, however, to argue that Scalia was merely a strict constitutionalist. His personal stances were not particularly opaque. His worldview was hardly inscrutable.

 

So, let's please let him own those views. He was never able to see homosexuality as something other than a moral issue (“If we cannot have moral feelings against homosexuality, can we have it against murder?”) for which freedom for states, businesses, and individuals to judge according to traditional or religious values must be preserved. He never gave gay people the benefit of being treated as people -- whose rights, like everyone else's, were to be Constitutionally defended from pernicious actors or institutions. As personal failings go, I suppose a measured thing to say here is that it was at least understandable.

[knapplc]

From the Times article Mavric posted in another thread (which many people, apparently, didn't read):

 

One of the most revealing statements in today's opinion is the Court's grim warning that the criminalization of homosexual conduct is "an invitation to subject homosexual persons to discrimination both in the public and in the private spheres." It is clear from this that the Court has taken sides in the culture war, departing from its role of assuring, as neutral observer, that the democratic rules of engagement are observed. Many Americans do not want persons who openly engage in homosexual conduct as partners in their business, as scoutmasters for their children, as teachers in their children's schools, or as boarders in their home. They view this as protecting themselves and their families from a lifestyle that they believe to be immoral and destructive. The Court views it as "discrimination" which it is the function of our judgments to deter. So imbued is the Court with the law profession's anti-anti-homosexual culture, that it is seemingly unaware that the attitudes of that culture are not obviously "mainstream"; that in most states what the Court calls "discrimination" against those who engage in homosexual acts is perfectly legal; that proposals to ban such "discrimination" under Title VII have repeatedly been rejected by Congress; that in some cases such "discrimination" is mandated by federal statute; and that in some cases such "discrimination" is a constitutional right.

 

Let me be clear that I have nothing against homosexuals, or any other group, promoting their agenda through normal democratic means. Social perceptions of sexual and other morality change over time, and every group has the right to persuade its fellow citizens that its view of such matters is the best. That homosexuals have achieved some success in that enterprise is attested to by the fact that Texas is one of the few remaining states that criminalize private, consensual homosexual acts. But persuading one's fellow citizens is one thing, and imposing one's views in absence of democratic majority will is something else. I would no more require a state to criminalize homosexual acts — or, for that matter, display any moral disapprobation of them — than I would forbid it to do so. What Texas has chosen to do is well within the range of traditional democratic action, and its hand should not be stayed through the invention of a brand-new "constitutional right" by a Court that is impatient of democratic change. It is indeed true that "later generations can see that laws once thought necessary and proper in fact serve only to oppress," and when that happens, later generations can repeal those laws. But it is the premise of our system that those judgments are to be made by the people, and not imposed by a governing caste that knows best. . .

 

 

Scalia's slavish adherence to the Constitution, as written over 200 years ago when it was legal to persecute homosexuals, is the context in which he writes this. He is not stupid; he knows full well that by failing to cast the cloak of legal coverage over homosexuals (which he defends not doing because the act came from a legal interpretation ((which he disagreed with)) and not from a democratic vote), he leaves the door open to further discrimination. He is not doing this because OH WELL OUR HANDS ARE TIED, he's doing this because he doesn't want to do the other thing.

 

He offers caveat after caveat, "Let me be clear that I have nothing against homosexuals...", "I would no more require a state to criminalize homosexual acts... than I would forbid it to do so." But after such protestations, he sides with those who would discriminate.

 

He does this again and again. Belabor the point, demand proof. I'm not going to give any - I've spent too much time on this as it is. It's out there. People who appreciate Scalia's worldview will protest. Let them, I'm done.

 

 

As personal failings go, I suppose the best thing to say here is that it is an understandable one.

 

 

All of what you wrote was well said. But on this point, we'll have to agree to disagree.

[zoogs]

To borrow the reductio ad absurdum tact of which Justice Scalia was quite fond, a murderer or criminal is often understandable, too -- if inexcusable. But a more reasonable example might be that of Watchman's Atticus Finch.

 

More than most who held or hold attitudes similar to his own, Scalia was in a position to cause or prolong real harm to large numbers of real people. He wasn't the only one, but he was definitely among the most active and most successful in that fight.

 

I don't think any of that means he should be wished ill in passing (I'm a little namby pamby, argle bargle)*...but his juristic legacy is what it is. On these sections at least I think the criticisms you've outlined have been largely well earned.

 

* To be clear, I don't think that's what you're doing either, but it seems with some of the other reactions that such a clarification might be necessary.

[HuskerNation1]

Idiotic poll in the first place.

[JJ Husker]

Just a little explanation for my no vote.

 

I think there is room for a person to have moral issues with homosexuality without being labeled a bigot. To earn that bigot moniker, I believe takes more than what we saw from Scalia. As our priest was saying in his homily a couple weeks ago, all persons are worthy of oour love and respect but that does not mean we have to accept and condone all their behaviors and beliefs.