# Justice Roberts: Do we need ANOTHER hardcore Catholic on the Supreme Court? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [August 2, 2005, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-roberts-do-we-need-another-hardcore-catholic-on-the-supreme-court/315324 "2005-08-02T17:06:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 9:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-roberts-do-we-need-another-hardcore-catholic-on-the-supreme-court/315324/81 "2005-08-03T09:59:46Z")
I thought that both the current Democrat party and the current Republican party stemmed from the same predecessor? ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 11:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-roberts-do-we-need-another-hardcore-catholic-on-the-supreme-court/315324/82 "2005-08-03T11:45:00Z")
Does anyone in this thread, bigot or otherwise, feel that there is a realistic chance Roberts will not be confirmed? ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 12:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-roberts-do-we-need-another-hardcore-catholic-on-the-supreme-court/315324/83 "2005-08-03T12:51:38Z")
> [@Monty](#): > > I thought that both the current Democrat party and the current Republican party stemmed from the same predecessor? Not in any substantive way. The Democrats are direct descendants of the Democrat-Republican Party, which was extant almost from the beginning of the country. The D-R’s were in opposition to the Federalists at first, then the Whigs. When slavery became a hot issue, the Whigs split because of it. The Southern Whigs joined the D-R party (by this time just called the Democrats) and the northern Whigs joined several other smaller parties (including the Free-Soil Party, a prohibitionist group) to form the Republicans. ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-roberts-do-we-need-another-hardcore-catholic-on-the-supreme-court/315324/84 "2005-08-03T12:55:42Z")
Ugh. Hit submit too soon. So while the Republicans and Democrats share that Whig provenance, it’s only a part of their history and the Democrats, for one, existed well before the Whigs in the first place. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 2:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-roberts-do-we-need-another-hardcore-catholic-on-the-supreme-court/315324/85 "2005-08-03T14:12:34Z")
> [@](#): > > Now when we go for Sunday Mass we hear homilies delivered against liberals and preaching from the pulpit. On the other hand, I have a friend who constantly complains about the pinko anti-American priests in his parish ranting their politics. Priests should not bring politics (as distinct from moral precepts) into the pulpit and it probably depends on the region and the priest when getting a bad combination. > [@](#): > > It pains me to see them ignoring that this party was founded in part by he anti-Catholic Know Nothings in the 19th century. The (generally pro-slavery), anti-immigrant, Know-Nothings had almost nothing to do with the foundation of the Republican party. On the other hand, it was the Democrats who defected in droves to avoid voting for Al Smith and the southern Democrats were no friends to the Catholic Church. When it comes to political parties, fight or defend them on their current stands. They have each switched positions often enough that any appeal to history quickly becomes an eercise in futility. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 2:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-roberts-do-we-need-another-hardcore-catholic-on-the-supreme-court/315324/86 "2005-08-03T14:23:16Z")
> [@foolsguinea](#): > > You know, I thnk we need Lani Guinier to devise a new way of picking justices. I hope you meant for that to be funny, because I got a good chuckle out of it! ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 2:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-roberts-do-we-need-another-hardcore-catholic-on-the-supreme-court/315324/87 "2005-08-03T14:35:19Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > The (generally pro-slavery), anti-immigrant, Know-Nothings had almost nothing to do with the foundation of the Republican party. In '56, after the Know-Nothings backed the Kansas-Nebraska Act in their platform, the Northern Know-Nothings split from the party and endorsed Fremont, and then went on to join the Republicans. Not that, as you said, this has anything to do with the Republicans now. ---
**Author:** ![SemperFi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e5b9ba/32.png) [@SemperFi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SemperFi)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 3:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-roberts-do-we-need-another-hardcore-catholic-on-the-supreme-court/315324/88 "2005-08-03T15:11:37Z")
> [@The Highwayman](#): > > Above all, I thought my Church strove for social justice in society but it seems that American Catholics have turned a blind eye to this aspect of the faith and would rather focus most myopically on the abortion issue alone. “Above all” the Church stands for “social justice?” Not sure from which Catechism you’re reading. I thought “above all” the RC Church stood for glorifying and serving their God. It also appears to have escaped you that certain RCs could sincerely believe that opposing abortion is an imperative part of a “social justice” agenda and not a frolic and detour away from it. > [@](#): > > Now when we go for Sunday Mass we hear homilies delivered against liberals and preaching from the pulpit. Priest seemingly to have forgotten the humanity of Christ, our greatest teacher. Many have forgotten His petitions for brotherhood, replaced by the mealy-mouthed bile of the rotten conservative ideologues. I call BS. Tell me, honestly, how many times (a) you have gone to Mass in the past five years; and (b) a pries has delievered homilies against liberals or engaged in “mealy mouthed bile” (how can “bile” be “mealy mouthed?”) in behalf of “rotten conservative ideologues?” When I hear these sort of cartoonish portrayals of what is going on in RC churches, I am invariably led to believe, usually correctly, that the person speaking has rarely set foot in an actual RC church, or is just making crap up. Because in the last five years of sitting around various diocesan churches, I have heard politics of any kind mentioned . . . I don’t know, maybe five or six times, usually indirectly, as in an exhortation to “vote your conscience.” I know a number of women active in the Respect Life movement (the RC’s in-house anti-abortion group). One of their biggest complaints is that the American priests and bishops are unwilling to push the issue from the pulpit, unwilling to alienate any parishoner with uncomfortable messages. From what I gather, the average parish priest will mention abortion, directly or indirectly, either (0) or (1) times each year (that being Respect Life Sunday, and his decision to mention it or not being guided by how much he cares about the issue and how loath he is to be “negative” or “controversial”). Please tell me where your parish is that things go so very differently and that the priests (mostly educated in the '60s and '70s in the post-Vatican II tambourine era) are such red-meat ideologues – or shall we infer that (as with so many ignorant portrayals of the actually-liberal U.S. clergy supposedly railing against homosexuality and other social ills – which I’ve also not heard from many or any pulpits) it’s simply hyperbole? > [@](#): > > I hope it does before they find us leaving the flock. You’ve heard I take it of addition by subtraction? ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-roberts-do-we-need-another-hardcore-catholic-on-the-supreme-court/315324/89 "2005-08-03T15:40:28Z")
Well, Evil Captor, this isn’t going as well as you thought it would. Perhaps you’d like to take this opportunity to accuse Roberts of treason as well? After all, Roberts is a subject of an unholy foreign power, the Whore of Babylon itself, a dispenser of the Death Cookie? Can a catholic be a good American, or should we ship them all back to Europe where they can wallow in their slavery to popish superstitions? ---
**Author:** ![boret](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bcef8e/32.png) [@boret](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/boret)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-roberts-do-we-need-another-hardcore-catholic-on-the-supreme-court/315324/90 "2005-08-03T21:33:46Z")
> [@John Mace](#): > > Editorials get a lot more leeway, I believe. Of course the LAT and NYT are mainstream media that we’d all accept as cites, but not from their Op Ed pages. Farnkly, even if it was a real news story, though, there is less credibility when “unnamed sources” are quoted. > > And I didn’t mean to be snarky. You’re new around here, so I wouldn’t expect you to know all the unwritten “rules” of GD. I didn’t take it as snarky. Those are good rules. But to be more accurate, the sources have since been named - Durbin himself, and one of Durbin’s aides. They have admitted that, and only dispute the “accuracy” of the quote in non-denial denial pol double-speak. So yes, Durbin “backed away” from the story, as **furt** posted earlier, after taking some heat from Republicans for trying to apply a litmus test. However, Republican Sen. Tom Coburn reported a similar line of questioning with Roberts: > **[Home](https://www.newson6.com)** > > NewsOn6.com is your leading source for information in Tulsa, delivering local news, breaking news, weather, sports and video. > [@](#): > > He says Roberts ducked a couple of his questions Friday during a 45-minute meeting. He says Roberts wasn’t comfortable talking about how his Catholic faith influences his life and work. > > Coburn says he plans to ask the questions Roberts wouldn’t answer again at their next meeting. Litmus test or just more confusing spin? BTW, I don’t agree with the OP, or have any real concerns about Roberts being Catholic. But I’d like to know more about him. It’s almost amusing how he generates so much spin from both parties without saying anything definitive. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-roberts-do-we-need-another-hardcore-catholic-on-the-supreme-court/315324/91 "2005-08-03T21:45:55Z")
I don’t blame him for not being “comfortbale”. I don’t think questions about one’s faith are appropriate topics. If a Senator wants to ask if there is “anything in his personal life that would prevent him from ruling objectively”, that’s entirely appropriate. Singling out religion, and one religion in particular, just doesn’t sit well with me. ---
**Author:** ![boret](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bcef8e/32.png) [@boret](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/boret)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 10:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-roberts-do-we-need-another-hardcore-catholic-on-the-supreme-court/315324/92 "2005-08-03T22:04:19Z")
> [@John Mace](#): > > I don’t blame him for not being “comfortbale”. I don’t think questions about one’s faith are appropriate topics. If a Senator wants to ask if there is “anything in his personal life that would prevent him from ruling objectively”, that’s entirely appropriate. Singling out religion, and one religion in particular, just doesn’t sit well with me. I agree. But I think religion is still a big factor in politics, however many public objections are raised to these kind of questions. Has there ever been an admitted atheist on SCOTUS? I know it would be the kiss of death for most political ambitions, but I haven’t thought about judges (appointed or elected) in particular. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-roberts-do-we-need-another-hardcore-catholic-on-the-supreme-court/315324/93 "2005-08-03T22:11:54Z")
> [@boret](#): > > Has there ever been an admitted atheist on SCOTUS? Justice Davis didn’t belong to any church, but I don’t believe he was a public atheist. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Highwayman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7993a0/32.png) [@The\_Highwayman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Highwayman)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2005, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-roberts-do-we-need-another-hardcore-catholic-on-the-supreme-court/315324/94 "2005-08-03T23:39:35Z")
> [@SemperFi](#): > > It also appears to have escaped you that certain RCs could sincerely believe that opposing abortion is an imperative part of a “social justice” agenda and not a frolic and detour away from it. Well then, what about its opposition to capital punishment? See you are going to have a harder time trying to jibe your conservative beliefs with our faith than I will. Keep talking, we’ll make it a game. > [@SemperFi](#): > > I call BS. Tell me, honestly, how many times (a) you have gone to Mass in the past five years; and (b) a pries has delievered homilies against liberals or engaged in “mealy mouthed bile” (how can “bile” be “mealy mouthed?”) in behalf of “rotten conservative ideologues?” When I hear these sort of cartoonish portrayals of what is going on in RC churches, I am invariably led to believe, usually correctly, that the person speaking has rarely set foot in an actual RC church, or is just making crap up. Because in the last five years of sitting around various diocesan churches, I have heard politics of any kind mentioned . . . I don’t know, maybe five or six times, usually indirectly, as in an exhortation to “vote your conscience.” I know a number of women active in the Respect Life movement (the RC’s in-house anti-abortion group). One of their biggest complaints is that the American priests and bishops are unwilling to push the issue from the pulpit, unwilling to alienate any parishoner with uncomfortable messages. From what I gather, the average parish priest will mention abortion, directly or indirectly, either (0) or (1) times each year (that being Respect Life Sunday, and his decision to mention it or not being guided by how much he cares about the issue and how loath he is to be “negative” or “controversial”). You call BS, so I suppose this completely refutes me? Well, I’m not saying that this preaching from the pulpit has occurred everywhere but I can directly, **from experience** , tell you that a priest in my diocese gave a politically slanted harangue against “liberals.” This is not only shocking to me but very very off-putting _AND_ it did happen. Also, around election time, priests were directing their flocks to vote for the candidate that was pro-life. So don’t tell me what _MY_ experiences were please. I’m sure that this is not the case everywhere but where I’m from, it was certainly the case. I was merely relating what my experiences were and speculating. Next time, try and keep up. > [@SemperFi](#): > > Please tell me where your parish is that things go so very differently and that the priests I’ll only tell you that it is in Los Angeles county. If you want more detailed information, I would say “how does it feel to want?” > [@SemperFi](#): > > You’ve heard I take it of addition by subtraction? Yes, the Church is having a problem with too many people wanting to join, yes that is the problem. We should make room for them. Yes, that’s brilliant. Maybe some of us traditional Catholics, you know the type, the ones that have kept their religion under suppression, who moved to a new country and have craved out a stake in it from its very beginning, should give up their faith because a few angry Republicans say so? You know my reply buddy. I’m merely speculating again and I will never give up my religion. I think that our Church is something worth preserving and if it thinks that it can pair itself with such a loathsome and, at its heart, xenophobic institution as the Republican Party, I will surely sound the alarm. We belong to the Universal Church. We incorporate rather than exclude. We are the largest religion on earth because we are inclusive. Your kind seem to run counter to this spirit and that is why I believe that what I have stated struck such a nerve with you. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2005, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-roberts-do-we-need-another-hardcore-catholic-on-the-supreme-court/315324/95 "2005-08-04T02:08:56Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > Hmmm. I have re-read this thread twice, now, and I seem to still see the same questionable lines appearing on my screen. There are not, in fact, stricken from the record. You are simply trying a dodge of plausible deniability for having opened a rather bigoted thread in which you attempt to make an issue of a man’s poltics based on his association with a particular religious group. Tomndebb, I am disappointed with you. You call this a “rather bigoted thread” because I ask if the guy’s Catholicism could be a problem. Devout Catholicism, in fact. Is it INNATELY bigoted to ask if a guy’s adherence to a particular set of religious beliefs (Catholicism) which are associated with conservative issues: anti-abortion, anti-birth control, anti-freedom of speech on sexual issues – is gonna be a problem for those not far to the right of the political spectrum? Especially given that the two most Neanderthal right members of the Supreme Court are Thomas and Scalia, Catholics both? In a time when Catholic leadership is widely considered to be heading to the right? You think it’s bigoted to notice these things? Is it prejudice to connect the dots? What are you doing moderating a board devoted to fighting ignorance, if that is true? > [@](#): > > You have smeared the word “Catholic” all over this thread when your objection is to right-wing politics or to a particular philosophy of jurisprudence. Your claims that the RCC can (or will) exercise any control over an individual in a particular position are based on a (one hopes not deliberate) misreading of actual statements from various Catholic authorities over the last ten years. For example, you make a great deal out of calls by some clerics to link participation in the sacraments with particular political positions while significantly ignoring the fact that those clerics were a tiny minority within the church and that their opinions were actually condemned by the National Council of Catholic Bishops. Here’s some links for you that have raised my alarm: Forgive me dopers, for I have sinned: [In my rabid bigotry, I noted this move by some Catholics to excommunicate John Kerry for his tolerance of abortion.](http://www.cwnews.com/news/viewstory.cfm?recnum=32830) [In my blind prejudice, I noticed that the Vatican has become increasingly politically conservative, quashing progressive voices within the church with Republican-like fervor. I was particularly sinful in noting the new Pope has personally done a lot of the quashing and excommunicating and such.](http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0420/p01s04-wogi.html) [In my overweening pride, I noticed how conservatives are on the one hand expressing hope that Robert’s religious beliefs will affect his judgements, and catigating Dems and progressives that they must not make an issue of his religious beliefs. Taking note of such hypocrisy is surely arrogant.](http://www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050803/OPINION/508030356/1002/OPINION) [In my thoughtless heedlessness, I have noticed that Catholic justices Scalia and Thomas are not just conservative, but conservative in a cruel and indifferent manner.](http://www.cs.umass.edu/~immerman/play/IfBushChoseTheSupremeCourt.html) (And yes, Kennedy’s a Catholic with something resembling a heart under his robes, but all the indication are, Roberts a Scalia kinda guy, not a Kennedy kinda guy.) Maybe it’s not their Catholicism that makes Scalia and Thomas such scum, but in my unnatural observativeness, I have to wonder if there is a breed of “Catholic Conservative” that Scalia and Thomas and maybe Roberts belong to that make this kind of ugliness common. But that’s bigoted thinking, isn’t it? > [@](#): > > You have also made an odd claim regarding the pope without providing a citiation (or, more importantly, a context–and as anyone who has ever studied church history (as you have not) is aware, _context_ is _everything_ in such statements). You’re right, apparently the pope has personally not excommunicated any politicians for being in favor of abortions or even threatened to do so … yet. But apparently, some of his subordinates have. But I’m not supposed to notice this or I’m a bigot, right. Look, if I were a bigot I’d think ALL Catholics were conservative scum like Scalia. But I know that’s not true – there are many American Catholics who are at loggerheads with their church leadership on issues like abortion, birth control, women as preists and whatnot. And there are many who are not. And by all accounts, Roberts is one of the many who are not. So, I’m not supposed to notice this, or be concerned about it, or I’m a bigot. Well, message received. But probably not gonna be acted on. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2005, 2:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-roberts-do-we-need-another-hardcore-catholic-on-the-supreme-court/315324/96 "2005-08-04T02:15:16Z")
> [@Happy Scrappy Hero Pup](#): > > But Thomas and Scalia are split on major issues like capital punishment. So how do you reconcile that with their religion “directing” them on such matters? Check out the third cite in my response to TomnDebb. Seems a lot of things make other people think they’re peas in a pod. Perhaps you’re thinking they’re dissimilar at the molecular level or something? I’ll give you that! > [@](#): > > And, by the way, Rome is a city in Italy. The seat of Catholic power is Vatican City, which is a separate city and separate nation. Sorry, I read a lot of history, where the seat of Catholic power is referred to as Rome. Besides, once the Pope invades Philadelphia, as some here seem to think is a big concern of mind, all that will change. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2005, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-roberts-do-we-need-another-hardcore-catholic-on-the-supreme-court/315324/97 "2005-08-04T02:25:02Z")
> [@John Mace](#): > > But you’re still confusing Catholic with Social Conservative. If you want to link a religion to social conservatisn, it would be the evangelical and funamentalist Protestant faiths, not Catholics. But even then, to criticize a justice simply because of his faith is, well, unAmerican. As noted early, I think there’s a strains of conservative Catholicism that Roberts may belong to that is kinda like Protestant fundies, whom I also dislike, though not as much as Islamic fundies, who are at the top of my shit list. Sorry for having opinions. > [@](#): > > Perhaps we should sentence EC to spend a few weeks debating with some Jesuits 🙂 The lawyers on this board are bad enough, thank you very much. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2005, 2:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-roberts-do-we-need-another-hardcore-catholic-on-the-supreme-court/315324/98 "2005-08-04T02:39:29Z")
> [@SemperFi](#): > > No one would like that question (even though we’ve demonstrated that Jews are even more numerically “overrepresented” on the Supreme Court and in Congress than Catholics could ever be ([American Jews](http://www.jbuff.com/c052302.htm)), and even though the possibility of split loyalties to Israel and the U.S. isn’t objectively more ridiculous than the possibility of split allegience to the Constitution and the Vatican (and it is only you who assure us that the Constitution is incompatible with Vatican policy). Actually if we had some Jewish neocons up for the Court, I’d be raising alarms, too. Or Protestant fundies. They’ve all got beliefs that are alarming to any thinking person. ---
**Author:** ![astorian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ad7895/32.png) [@astorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astorian)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2005, 2:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-roberts-do-we-need-another-hardcore-catholic-on-the-supreme-court/315324/99 "2005-08-04T02:44:29Z")
Once again, I point out to Evil Captor that Scalia and Thomas have NEVER tried to assert that fetuses are entitled to rights under the Constiution, nor have they argued that human life begins at conception. They may well (and probably do) believe that as Catholics, but they have NEVER claimed in any of their opinions that the Constitution forbids abortion. If they were taking their marching orders from Rome, would they not do so? Instead, they have argued ONLY that Roe vs. Wade was wrongly decided and utterly ungrounded in the Constitution (and, as I’ve noted, even the liberal, pro-choice Ruth Bader Ginsburg agrees) and that the Constitution has nothing to say about abortion, pro or con. You can agree with their take on this issue or disagree, but you CAN’T claim they’re parroting the Vatican’s line on abortion, because they’re not. For that matter, even in his dissenting opinion on the sodomy law case, Clarence Thomas NEVER tried to argue that sodomy laws should be upheld on the grounds that homosexuality is evil or sinful in the eyes of God. To the contrary, Thomas’ opinion said that sodomy laws were “supremely silly,” hardly something he’d say if he were basing his decisions on religious dogma. Thomas NEVER tried to argue that sodomy should be illegal because it’s a sin; rather, he argued that a law isn’t unconstitutional simply because it’s silly. He thought sodomy laws should be repealed by legislatures, but that the Supreme Court had no business overturning them all. The record shows that Scalia and Thomas have NOT been basing decisions on their religious beliefs, nor have their decisions been ones that John Paul II or Benedict XVI could have wholeheartedly endorsed. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [August 4, 2005, 2:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-roberts-do-we-need-another-hardcore-catholic-on-the-supreme-court/315324/100 "2005-08-04T02:45:06Z")
> [@Happy Scrappy Hero Pup](#): > > None of whom _are_ the Church. > > I haven’t been whooshed, amigo. Yeah, Archbishops and Bishops … very low ranking Catholics, I take it? Hardly in a position to speak with authority on Church matters. Well, at least I don’t have to worry about YOU being all that impressed by Catholic leaders’ pronouncements, HSHP … [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-roberts-do-we-need-another-hardcore-catholic-on-the-supreme-court/315324.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/justice-roberts-do-we-need-another-hardcore-catholic-on-the-supreme-court/315324.md?page=6)