Is Kagan to the right or left of Stevens? (and on what issues)

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

Nobody is liberal or conservative in the abstract. Those are relative positions in an ever-shifting spectrum.

The most pointed question is whether the court is moving right, left or staying the same and that is defined solely in terms of Kagan versus Stevens.

Discuss.


(On the First Amendment she is distinctly to Stevens' right and is thus unacceptable to me, but nobody asked me. On the other hand, many on DU and much of the American left don't have much use for the First Amendment on issues like pornography and 'hate speech', so Kagan's sympathy for weakening the First Amendment for purposes of shaping private speech to suit a governmental motive or philosophy may not be too controversial here.)

[Jennicut]

1. It is not going to really change for the time being until Scalia or Kennedy go.

They are the next oldest Justices that were picked by conservatives. And then there has to be a Dem in office when they leave to make a difference. Ginsburg is probably next but Obama will most likely pick that next Justice.

Is Kagan going to be a right wing justice like Alito or Roberts...or Scalia or Thomas? I doubt it. Is she more to the left then Kennedy? I think so. She will be in the left block of the Supreme Court. Who knows what happens over time.

[alp227]

2. I don't really know yet, but a bunch of conservatives complained about her being liber

Right Wing Responses to Kagan for SCOTUS, a blog post from Right Wing Watch, published responses from several conservative organizations. Christian conservative orgs were concerned about her support for abortion and gay rights. Other pundits just personally attacked her just because Obama picked her. Bill Kristol accused Kagan of being anti-military. Former Reagan attorney general Edwin Meese and Federalist Society co-founder David McIntosh took issue with Kagan's lack of judicial experience.

On the other hand, Jonathan Turley has a good analysis showing that Kagan leans towards the right on hate speech and terror suspect issues.

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

3. It is safe to say that anyone Obama nominated would e attacked by the right as too liberal

Thus those attacks carry no information.

And it is safe to say that a few on the left would attack almost anyone Obama nominated so those attacks cary little information.

But in practice, the Republicans could have been a lot more upset and progressives less upset.

She is left of center, but that isn't saying much these days.

She's a moderate pick. For good or ill.

[BeyondGeography]

4. The Stevens that was nominated by Ford?

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

5. That transcends irrelevance

Are you arguing that Stevens has not been the strongest Justice on expressive rights during his tenure?

[BeyondGeography]

6. More like Stevens' own history should warn you against snap judgments about nominees

But you want to revive your "Obama is moving the Court to the right" BS so keep playing.

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

8. Sorry, that's even sillier

Are you proposing that we should set aside what little we know about a nominee because some other nominees have defied expectations?

The best available evidence is the evidence one uses when making important decisions.

One does not make important decisions based on flights of fancy about what unlikely things might happen.

Your other thoughtful argument, that what I am saying is BS, is noted and given the weight it deserves.

[BeyondGeography]

12. See post #11

And best of luck with your thread.

[dsc]

7. actually he hasn't

He authored the seven forbidden words case for example.

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

10. I try to write with precision (and may or may not have failed)

In absolute terms, Stevens is a Warren Court moderate which makes him a Rehnquist court liberal and a Roberts court radical.

Federal Communications Commission v. Pacifica Foundation was 1978, relatively early in Stevens' tenure.

I was not trying to say that Stevens was the most First Amendment friendly justice who ever served on the court during Stevens long tenure, but that he was the most expressive-rights friendly justice over his long tenure. (I would take Douglas over Stevens, for instance.)

Put it this way, if the ACLU had an annual award for best Justice from 1975-2010 Stevens would have won the award more years than anyone else, but his wins would be concentrated on the later part of his tenure. (He would probably have won 15-20 straight times post 1990.)

These things are relative. In 1975 there were some actual liberal justices on the court. In 2010, not so much.

[Vattel]

9. It appears from her remarks that she is to the right of

Stevens and Scalia on the detainement of citizens who are alleged to be enemy combatants. She rejected the Scalia-Stevens position that such persons must be charged with a crime or released.

[WeDidIt]

11. We won't really know until we have some written decisions

Going strictly off what Stevens wrote prior to his elevation to the High Court, he'd have been along the lines of Roberts if one were prognosticating how he would rule in specific cases.

[Fire1]

13. If "the market" is happy with her, she's definitely to the right. n/t

[TheKentuckian]

14. She's nearly a blank slate unless you give her credit/blame for cases

argued as Solicitor General. If those count then she is on balance probably in the middle of the right wing of the court or at least kickin it with Kennedy (one of the most conservative jurist in the history of the high court).

I assume she must be to the right of Stevens almost across the board or some tell of it would have slipped to the surface by now, just to generate a lil leftist street cred.