And Finally ... The New York Times Weighs In

(Hat tip: Amy Welborn)

The commentary we've all been waiting for. The "newspaper of record" gets around to noticing the religious make-up of the Carhart majority:

The five justices who turned the Supreme Court around last week and upheld the ban on “partial birth abortion” had much in common.

All are men. All were nominated by conservative Republican presidents. And, it was widely noted, all are Roman Catholics.

Did their religion matter? Should it even be discussed? In the wake of the 5-4 ruling in Gonzales v. Carhart, these questions have been raised and debated in venues from the blog of the American Constitution Society (where Geoffrey R. Stone, a constitutional law professor, said the justices’ religious identity was “too obvious, and too telling, to ignore,”) to ABC’s “The View,” (where Rosie O'Donnell declared, "How about separation of church and state in America?" according to ABC News.)

The pushback from conservative Catholics was immediate - even pre-emptive. Bill Donohue, president of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, declared, “We need more, not fewer, Catholics on the Supreme Court.” On his Web site, the Rev. Richard John Neuhaus, an influential conservative, wrote last week, “I expect it is on the minds of many, but so far there has been only marginal public comment on the fact that all five in the Carhart majority are Catholics.” He added, “What can one say? Know-Nothings of the world unite?” [ED.: she failed to mention this preemptive post from a certain blogger.]

This discussion was probably inevitable: Catholics, for the first time, hold a majority of seats on the Supreme Court, after decades when there were, typically, only one or maybe two “Catholic seats” on the bench. Two of the Catholic justices, Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito, were confirmed only in the past two years, in an ideologically charged environment in which all sides were eager for clues on how they might rule on abortion rights and other hot-button issues.

With so much unknown about their legal leanings, their religion became a proxy for both sides -- a source of reassurances for conservatives, and of anxiety for liberals. But the nominees’ supporters discouraged any questions about the role of their faith in the confirmation hearings, essentially arguing that it would amount to an unacceptable “religious test” for public office.

***
John Green, a senior fellow at the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, said that the existence of a Catholic majority on the court should not be minimized as a historical marker of “just how much the nation has changed over the last century.” But, he added, “When it comes to predicting what they will do, it’s important to note that this is a Republican Catholic majority.” [ED.: You mean party matters?]

In fact, American Catholics are very much a two-party religion. The Catholic vote has typically split in recent presidential elections, and Catholic elected officials fill the top ranks of both parties. Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senator Edward M. Kennedy, Senator Patrick Leahy and the 2004 presidential nominee, Senator John Kerry, are all Catholics - and Democrats who support abortion rights. [ED.: And let's not forget Joe Biden, Dick Dirtbag, Jennifer Granholm, Bill Richardson, etc., etc. In short, almost every prominent elected Democrat who is Catholic is out of step with his or her Church on the issue of abortion.]

[More]

My Comments:
Actually, fairly even-handed for The Slimes ... errrr ... Times.

And it doesn't paint a pretty picture for those pro-life Catholics who would like to support Democrat candidates for office.


Previous Pro Ecclesia posts on this subject:
More Supreme Anti-Catholic Bigotry

Church Defenders Take On Anti-Catholic Cartoonist

And the Philadelphia Enquirer [sic] Joins In (With an Anti-Catholic Cartoon)

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