Hebraic Senator Dianne Feinstein Attacks Judicial Nominee’s Catholic Faith

ed note–it goes without saying it, but we’ll say it anyway–

CAN YOU JUST IMAGINE the Jramatic campaign–tsunamic and volcanic–of screeching, hollering, shrieking, screaming, kvetching, robe-rending, knuckle-biting, face-clawing, etc that would ensue if some non-Goysiche nominee for some governmental post, even as far down as the county dog catcher in Cobb County–were attacked by a Gentile lawmaker of ANY PERSUASION–Christian, Muslim or whatever–because of what their ‘faith’ encompassed?

nationalreview.com

This afternoon, during a confirmation hearing for 7th Circuit Court of Appeals nominee Amy Coney Barrett, Democratic senator Dianne Feinstein attacked the nominee for her Roman Catholic faith.

Barrett is a law professor at the University of Notre Dame who has written about the role of religion in public life and delivered academic lectures to Christian legal groups. Drawing on some of these materials, Feinstein launched a thinly veiled attack on Barrett’s Catholic faith, asserting that her religious views will prevent her from judging fairly.

“When you read your speeches, the conclusion one draws is that the dogma lives loudly within you,” Feinstein said. “And that’s of concern when you come to big issues that large numbers of people have fought for for years in this country.” Feinstein is clearly hinting here at the Supreme Court decision in Roe v. Wade, a ruling that Feinstein supports so vociferously that she has even called it a “super-precedent.”

Other Democratic senators took issue with Barrett over her faith as well. Senate minority whip Dick Durbin criticized Barrett’s use of the term “orthodox Catholic,” insisting that it unfairly maligns Catholics who do not hold certain positions about abortion or the death penalty. (Durbin himself is a Catholic who abandoned his previous pro-life position.) “Do you consider yourself an orthodox Catholic?” he later asked Barrett point blank.

And Hawaii senator Mazie Hirono snarked, “I think your article is very plain in your perspective about the role of religion for judges, and particularly with regard to Catholic judges.”

These criticisms echo a report from the left-wing Alliance for Justice, which alleged that as a judge Barrett “would put her personal beliefs ahead of the law.” This and other claims contained in the report are completely unsubstantiated, much like the charge levied by Feinstein.

In fact, Barrett has explicitly written that “judges cannot — nor should they try to — align our legal system with the Church’s moral teaching whenever the two diverge.” She has also insisted that judges ought to recuse themselves in situations when their faith conflicts with their judicial responsibility.

One would think these arguments would resolve Democrats’ concerns, but it seems that those on the left are indeed willing to take issue with Barrett’s determination that Catholic judges should recuse themselves if personal convictions stemming from their faith would impede their ability to do their job.

Feinstein’s comments this afternoon revealed that anti-Catholic bigotry is still alive in the U.S., even, and perhaps especially, among those leftists who are the first to decry prejudice and discrimination against other minorities.