Open thread October 21, 2022

Today’s ‘Originalism’ thread is all about a paper which reveals that the stated principle has modern roots, does not date back any further than ‘Brown v. Board of Education’, and has much to do with the legal musings of one Robert Bork, starting in 1971. Bork went on to inspire Justice Sam Alito, who admires Bork immensely as it turns out. Originalism guides the thinking of five current justices apparently.

The Conservative Movement’s Favorite Legal Theory Is Rooted in Racism

Slate – April 6, 2021

At least five justices on the Supreme Court identify as originalists, meaning they believe judges must interpret the Constitution as it was understood when ratified. Originalism is ascendant everywhere: on SCOTUS, on the lower courts stacked with Donald Trump nominees, in law schools and Congress and state legislatures. The Republican Party endorses originalism in its platform every four years. GOP politicians wield the doctrine to justify their own policies to attack those favored by Democrats. Progressive lawyers may fight and Democrats may gripe about it, but originalism is clearly here to stay.

All of which raises an important question: Where, exactly, did originalism come from? Its proponents frequently assert that it is a reaction to freewheeling liberal judicial activists imposing their own views on the Constitution through an approach often called “living constitutionalism.” In a groundbreaking article published in American Political Science Review, however, University of Chicago Ph.D. candidate Calvin TerBeek argues that modern originalism arose out of the backlash to Brown v. Board of Education, the landmark 1954 Supreme Court decision prohibiting public school segregation. TerBeek’s research—which spanned 14 archival collections, thousands of newspapers and magazines, and interviews with key players—all points in one direction: Originalism has fundamentally racist roots. …

How New Yorkers Are Stepping In to Help Asylum Seekers

NY Times – Oct 22

Volunteers are collecting donations, delivering pizzas and even opening up their homes to help Venezuelan migrants arriving by bus from Texas. 

Tonya Roman was working her shift as a cleaner at Port Authority last week when she saw a young volunteer take off his sneakers and give them to a newly arrived migrant who had just stepped off a bus. She was struck by the act.

“It’s like a Jesus moment,” she said. “Who gives the shoes off their feet to a stranger? And I said, ‘I have to do my part.’”

Ms. Roman, 54, who lives in Newark, N.J., was among those on Wednesday morning who stopped by a cordoned off area of the bus terminal, where volunteers were receiving new arrivals, to donate a rolling cart full of winter clothes that she had brought from home.

The thousands of asylum seekers who have arrived in New York City since the spring face daunting challenges as they try to rebuild their lives in a new country. Most arrived with little more than the clothes on their backs after a grueling overland trek from South America to the Texas border, where they were then bused north by the Republican governor, Greg Abbott, and the Democrat-led city of El Paso. 

But their arrivals are being eased somewhat by an outpouring of support from around New York.

While the city has provided shelter, meals and medical services, its response has been at times halting or chaotic. A number of charities and aid groups have stepped in to fill the gaps, distributing badly needed items like winter coats, baby formula and cellphones. Some volunteers are even opening up their homes.

At the Port Authority Bus Terminal, about a dozen volunteers have arrived before dawn every day to greet people getting off buses from Texas with sandwiches, fruit and donated clothes.

Early on Wednesday, Ilze Thielmann, 56, was directing volunteers scrambling to greet new arrivals, distribute food and organize donated clothes, diapers and other items. A small area of the bus terminal was guarded by uniformed officers and filled with folding chairs; boxes of apples, bagels, and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches were at the ready.

“It’s just an outpouring of love, there’s no other way to put it,” said Ms. Thielmann, a retired lawyer. She was there helping to coordinate the efforts with her volunteer group, Team TLC NYC, along with Power Malu, 45, who runs the group Artists-Athletes-Activists, and Adama Bah, a community organizer.

Many of the new arrivals were families with young children, and would eventually make their way to the nearby Row NYC hotel, where the city has set up an intake center. …