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Of Robert Bork and Other Matters: A Different Conservative View
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16475 |
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Section : |
MODERN THOUGHT
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| Issue
Date : |
5 / 1989 |
7,568 Words |
| Author
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Florence A. Ruderman
Florence A. Ruderman is associate professor of sociology at
Brooklyn College in New York City. |
Early in the Senate battle over the nomination of Robert Bork to serve on the Supreme Court, I received a letter from the University Centers from Rational Alternatives (UCRA), one of the conservative organizations of which I am a member. The letter informed me that "Nat Glazer and Sidney Hook felt…we should comment on the demagogic accusations thrown against Judge Bork" and asked for my signature on a statement supporting Bork's candidacy. For reasons that I will explain below, I was a little surprised by at least Sidney Hook's support of Robert Bork. In any case, I felt that I could not add my name to the list. In a short letter in response, I explained that: "I am not particularly supportive of the Bork nomination. In fact, I'm rather surprised that Nat Glazer and Sidney Hook do support it. As a conservative, I approve of a rather restrictive view of the role of the Supreme Court. I see a danger in the endless proliferation of 'rights' (while duties and restraints evaporate). But a conservative justice, too, needs some sense, and Bork does not seem to have any. Many of his decisions, and statements, in the past have been strikingly wrong-headed; this, too, is dangerous. That he may change his positions (in fact has already changed his views) on some critical issues only raises new questions, and is hardly a basis of supporting his nomination."
The confirmation battle is over now, and the dust has begun to settle--somewhat. But in some ways, the battle continues. Commentary has had a long article on the nomination and its outcome, and this was followed by a lengthy exchange of letters between the author, Suzanne Garment, and readers. The exchange suggests that the dust has not fully settled, and will not, for some time to come. And Bork himself is keeping the war alive: After the defeat of his nomination he has resigned from the federal judiciary and is now devoting himself to writing, lecturing, and keeping before the public his view of all that occurred. Many conservatives have been left bitter by the defeat. And in the mouths of some conservatives, like myself, who did not support the Bork nomination, there remains a strangely bad taste, for other reasons. Looking back over all that has happened, then, and goaded in particular by the pro-Bork presentations in Commentary, I would like to offer a different view--as a conservative. I would like to explain more fully than was possible in my short letter to URCA (quoted above) why I could not support Bork, and why I have been unable to share the apocalyptic visions his defeat aroused in many other conservatives. Not only do I not share their outrage and sense that Bork's defeat was a defeat for democracy, I feel that this time, our imperfectly functional and truly imperiled democracy did rather well, if not all along the way, at least in
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