According to Mitt Romney, speaking today at a National Rifle Association function, Judicial Review of Laws by the Supreme Court is "Required" to protect us all from laws that restrict our constitutional rights. He is of course talking about the Supreme Courts review of President Obama's Health care reform law. But, I wonder what his opinion is of the California Supreme Courts review of proposition 8, or of The Federal Supreme Courts review of Proposition 8 or DOMA, which will undoubtedly come.
I actually completely agree with him on the point that Courts must be able to review laws made by popular votes or by legislative votes. Looking back through our history, it has been the Supreme Court that protected the rights of minority groups from laws passed by popular votes that discriminated against them. Civil rights for people of Color, Interracial Marriage, both of these issues were not popular in the public view. Left to popular votes alone, how many years would have passed before these discriminatory laws were toppled?
So, let the Supreme Court review health care reform. If they find that some part of it is unconstitutional, I can live with that. We need health care reform, no doubt, and even if the current law is found to be unconstitutional I believe it will come because it has to. There is no way to support the current system financially. But I hope that when other issues, like Same Sex Marriage are there in "Judicial Review", that Romney and the Republican Party will remember his comments today.
Somehow, I doubt it.
