Choosing Optics Over Competence
Imagine your five-year-old daughter was being wheeled into surgery to have a defective heart valve replaced. What would be the most important qualification for the surgeon about to cut her open? Would it be the doctor’s race or gender? When the hospital’s chief administrator decided that it was more important that the members of surgical staff “looked like the community” than their level of competence, he put your daughter’s life at risk. As a parent, if I suspected that this was the case, I would choose a different hospital. The U.S. Supreme Court is the last word on what constitutes law in our country. The exercise of this sweeping power has and will continue to have life-altering consequences on the millions of people who live in America. What then, should be the most important qualification for the selection of a Supreme Court Justice? Heather MacDonald’s compelling piece in the City Journal exposes the absurdity of elevating race, gender or any other criteria beyond competence, integrity and temperament governing the selection for membership on the nation’s highest court. By limiting the selection of the next justice to a black woman, MacDonald notes that President Biden is “rendering 98 percent of all possible candidates beyond consideration because they lack `qualifications’ that have nothing to do with judging.”
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