5 times campus leftists came for the Constitution
In a volatile election year with a Supreme Court nomination, questions of constitutionality often surfaced in the news cycle.
Here are five instances in which campus leftists came for the Constitution.
A Harvard Law professor advocated for a “constitutionalism” that takes an “ax” to the concept of “free-speech ideology” and “property rights.”
The professor said that “common-good constitutionalism” does not intend to maximize individual autonomy or avoid governmental abuse of power. Instead, the “central aim of the constitutional order is to promote good rule, not to ‘protect liberty’ as an end in itself.”
Missouri state Rep. Tony Lovasco told Campus Reform that Vermeule’s notion of “common-good constitutionalism” is “not only historically inaccurate but also inherently abhorrent.”
Following Amy Coney Barrett’s confirmation to the Supreme Court, a Boston College law professor pushed for a new “specialized court” to deal with “the most contentious” legal issues, such as abortion.”
The “United States Constitutional Court” would serve as the new highest court of the land, he wrote in a New York Times op-ed.
“The Supreme Court needs a breather — a chance to reboot. The United States Constitutional Court would give it that,” he said.
A Vanderbilt class of more than 800 students was asked on an assignment if the Constitution was “designed to perpetuate white supremacy.” The “correct” answer to the question of whether the nation’s founding document is inherently racist was “true.”
The class was the largest that Vanderbilt had ever taught.
”All of the quiz’s answers would come directly from a recorded lecture...the questions were exact quotes from the lecture,” one student told Campus Reform.
A law professor at the University of Texas-Austin called for changes to the “outdated” language of the Constitution.
In an op-ed for The Hill, he said that the founding document’s “gendered and racist words stand in the way of true reconciliation in this divided country and have no place in any modern society.”
“Imagine how schoolchildren must feel when they read the Constitution in their basic civics course,” he wrote. “Some will be made to feel less than welcome in their own country… The highest law of the land creates a hierarchy of citizenship.”
A philosophy and religion professor at North Central College in Naperville, Illinois called the Constitution racist in “design and effect.” He said that “white cultural common sense” is aimed at killing “enough” Black people.
When asked by a social media user about his proposed changes to the founding document to make it “non-racist,” Kotsko replied, “abolish state autonomy, the Senate, and the EC. Add an affirmative unconditional right to vote for all citizens. Abolish local control and funding of schools.”
Kotsko refused to provide comment to Campus Reform on the grounds that it is “an illegitimate and harmful pseudo-journalistic enterprise” stating that its “only purpose” is “to encourage harassment of professors and threaten their livelihoods.”
Follow the author of this article on Twitter: @BenZeisloft
