It was a wonderful two days, with the Supreme Court
strengthening the Fair Housing Act and endorsing the Affordable Care Act and
marriage equality.
For many Americans, each ruling was worth celebrating, and
for a moment, there was the sense that the country had undergone a massive,
fundamental correction. There was enough good news to take our minds off of Charleston
and what that tragedy tells us about how far we have to go.
The New York Times’ Paul Krugman was optimistic as the
weekend arrived. The health-care decision, he
wrote, “means that the big distractions – the teething problems of the
website, the objectively ludicrous but nonetheless menacing attempts at legal
sabotage – are behind us and we can focus on the reality of health reform.”
We wish.
Republicans in Congress quickly started planning to destroy
the health-care act piece by piece, by cutting off funding for individual parts
of it. And Republican presidential candidates quickly lashed out at the rulings
on both health care and marriage equality.
Mike Huckabee called the marriage-equality decision “an
out-of-control act of unconstitutional, judicial tyranny” and said that the
court “can no more repeal the laws of nature and nature’s God on marriage than
it can the law of gravity.”
“Today,” Rick Santorum tweeted, “5 unelected judges
redefined the foundational unit of society.”
Ted Cruz said the health-care and marriage-equality rulings
have given us “some of the darkest 24 hours in our nation’s history.”
“Marriage between a man and a woman was established by
God, and no earthly court can alter that,” said Bobby Jindal. The ruling,
he said, “will pave the way for an all-out assault against the religious
freedom rights of Christians who disagree with this decision.”
Jeb Bush, predictably, bobbed and weaved. Donald Trump,
curiously, tried to link Bush to the marriage decision through former President
George Bush, who appointed Chief Justice John Roberts to the court. “Once again
the Bush-appointed Supreme Court Justice John Roberts has let us down,” puffed
Trump, ignoring the fact that Roberts voted against the marriage-equality
ruling.
We can assume that marriage equality and the Affordable Care
Act – which needs considerable reform to make adequate health care a right, not
a privilege – will be major topics in the 2016 presidential election. Good.
Because both issues are important, and they can lead us to a deep discussion of
a question that Justice Roberts has posed. He raised it in a different tone,
chastising the justices who voted in favor of marriage equality. But it’s a
good question:
“Just who do we think we are?”
This is a big country. And we are deeply divided – and
deeply segregated. And not just by race and income. We are segregated by
philosophy and understanding and deeply held beliefs. The East Coast and West
Coasts are indeed Left Coasts. And for those of us
relishing last week’s Supreme Court’s decisions, it is often as difficult for
us to understand many of the people of The Heartland as it is for them to
understand us.
Last week had a wonderful ending, but we still have far to
go. As the massacre of nine African-Americans in Charleston reminded us, Brown
v. Board of Education and Loving v. Virginia didn’t end racism in the United
States. And Obergefell v. Hodges won’t end
discrimination against members of the LGBT community. Leadership by elected
officials and the media is essential. But some of them are leading the push
backward.
In his eulogy at the service for the Rev. Clementa Pinckney, President Obama tried to offer hope,
referencing the words of “Amazing Grace.” “As a nation,” he
said, “out of this terrible tragedy, God has visited grace upon us, for he
has allowed us to see where we’ve been blind.”
Well, we can hope. Obama closed his eulogy similar to the
way politicians often close their addresses. But he injected a pause for
emphasis: “May God continue to shed His grace on the United… States
of America.”
We can hope. We can hope.
This article appears in Jul 1-7, 2015.
