As Democrats’ prospects brighten, GOP can thank the Supreme Court for exactly nothing

Democrats have had a good summer. The party’s prospects have brightened considerably since July, when President Biden’s approval rating sank to 38 percent – a deadly omen for midterm elections. Falling gas prices and a renewed focus on Donald Trump’s legal troubles have buoyed the president and his allies. Analysts who only weeks ago predicted typical congressional losses for the party in power (averaging 28 House seats and four Senate seats since 1934) now foresee a modest GOP win in the House and a real fight for the Senate.

The troops aren’t yet lining up for a victory parade. But if you were expecting to spend the next two years marching directly behind the horses, a little open space looks pretty good. A party led by an unpopular president with a mixed economic record may fare better in the midterms than history would predict.

Credit the Supreme Court, which overturned Roe v. Wade in June and triggered an unprecedented surge of voter registration among women. By August we saw the first eruption. In deep red Kansas, voters rejected a constitutional amendment meant to pave the way for an abortion ban. The anger was unmistakable, and it didn’t stop there. Women are swelling the voter rolls in other Republican strongholds as well as battleground states such as Michigan and Ohio.

If women turn their fire on Republican congressional candidates in November, Joe Biden could enjoy the easiest midterm ride since 2002. And the conservatives on the Supreme Court could find thank you cards from Democrats in their mailboxes.

Not that gratitude – especially the “thanks for the stick I needed for thrashing you” variety – equals affection. Abortion rights supporters have made their feelings about the justices clear. Their reaction is understandable and familiar: the Supreme Court has been dodging the slings and arrows of outrage forever. They’re the unelected “politicians in robes” who rule us from Mount Olympus and answer to no one. From the beginning, Americans have found them guilty of an unforgivable sin: partisanship.

We may as well curse them for breathing. The dictionary definition of partisanship boils down to allegiance, either to ideas or to people. If readers know of anyone who is guilty of neither, please call. A reporter will be dispatched right away.

Nothing highlights the silliness of denouncing partisanship better than abortion, the most emotionally charged issue of our era. There may be a functioning adult somewhere who has never given a thought to how they feel about it. Would anyone expect to find this blank slate among graduates of Harvard Law School? OK, a Yale grad might, but most of us would not. Yet abortion has so distorted the confirmation process for Supreme Court justices that nominees must claim their heads are that empty just to be considered.

Like everyone else, the Supremes prefer some ideas to others, and naturally we don’t like it when their preferences don’t align with ours. But criticizing them for having preferences (that is, for being “partisan”) is ridiculous.

I can’t say how much of the hissing over partisanship refers to political, rather than ideological, loyalty. Accusations of political partisanship engulfed the court during Bush v. Gore in 2000. But most cases revolve around interpreting the Constitution. Elena Kagan doesn’t think the way she does about affirmative action or the First Amendment because she’s a Democrat. She’s a Democrat because she thinks the way she does about those and other issues.

Her conservative colleagues have just demonstrated a strong interest in ideological partisanship and zero interest in the other kind. Americans have been telling pollsters for 49 years that they support Roe v. Wade. An election-minded court majority never would have touched it.

If election-minded Republican politicians – a solid majority in any era – mail any notes to Justice Alito and company, the message will probably read “Thanks for nothing.”

Michael Smith is a freelance opinion writer in Georgetown, Kentucky.