The Feld-Blog

Americans love to walk in circles and show off their hand-painted signs. If there’s a big controversial event going on in America, someone will protest it. It’s possible though that we’ve gone too far. While the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the case of Ayotte vs. Planned Parenthood, the court’s first abortion case in about 5 years, demonstrators on both sides of the abortion issue lined up outside the courthouse to protest. Why?

America has worked hard to preserve an independent judiciary. Good laws are not always popular and so if the courts were accountable to public opinion through votes, they would not be able to impartially interpret and administer the law. Supreme Court Justices do not and should not allow themselves to be swayed by public opinion much less by protestors. As such, it seems a futile effort to demonstrate in front of a political body whose job it is to ignore what you have to say.

Abortion has become such a charged subject that people merely hear the word and are automatically compelled to tell you their opinion. If these people are truly concerned about the future of abortion cases in the Supreme Court, they should be lobbying their Senators for or against Alito’s confirmation rather than marching their egos in front of the media’s cameras for no purpose but publicity - as if this issue needed more publicity. Think before you protest. What are you trying to accomplish and is this the most effective use of your time to accomplish that goal? In these protesters’ cases, I would conjecture that it’s not the most effective strategy.