Sotomayor And International Law
July 14, 2009
Today’s Wall Street Journal comments on an aspect of the Sotomayor nomination that has received little attention to date: her disturbing willingness to consider foreign law in interpreting, what is, after all, the U.S. Constitution. In a speech in May, she told an ACLU chapter that “’international and foreign law will be very important in the discussion of how to think about the unsettle issues in our own legal system.” To discourage the use of foreign or international law, she added, would ‘be asking American judges to close their minds to good ideas,’”
No, it wouldn’t be. It would be asking American judges simply to do their jobs – to interpret the law, not make it up. We voted for our state legislatures and for the Congress. We did not vote for the European Parliament or the UN Human Rights Council. If a law is unconstitutional, it should be found to be so based on our Constitution, not the principles of other nations, no matter how lofty they may sound.
That’s what democracy and the rule of law means. And that’s why the stakes are so high in the Sotomayor nomination.