"We need to transcend stale left-right tribal entities and forge a politics based on a commitment to liberal values"
This was tried before, it was called "fusionism" it led to Trump and MAGA.
The issue isn't a lack of unity among liberals, or something, it's the general political illiteracy.
Without grasping even the basic concepts, like rights and rights-protecting government, itself not possible without understanding the philosophical fundamentals that this is all based on, means any new liberal movement is as doomed to failure as the last attempts.
It's a lack of properly understanding liberal political philosophy that needs to be addressed.
It's questionable whether a fixed (or uniformly accepted [or imposed]) notion of "social justice" or "moral progress" can rightfully be demanded as a necessary component of a liberal agenda.
If "we need to transcend stale left-right tribal entities," we'd be well-advised not to open that can of worms.
"The right is deeply upset that progressives today certainly control the commanding heights of cultural institutions. But there are liberal remedies against their excesses—both in the court of law and also through the court of public opinion. Conservatives have already successfully used both to defend religious liberties and freedom of conscience, as David French has convincingly argued."
In today's polarized cultural climate, the phrase "religious liberties" sets my gay thumbs a-pricking that something wicked this way comes. Last year's Supreme Court decision in 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis (600 U.S. 570) was a victory for proponents of a wicked and novel form of so-called religious liberty that can only come at the expense of other people's civil rights. In that case, the Court found that a web designer's religious freedom trumped gay and lesbians' rights under Colorado law to do business with any concern that is open to the general public.
Here is how Princeton's Professor Robert P. George, a seasoned right-wing Catholic anti-gay activist and recipient of the Religious Freedom Institute’s 2023 Defender of Religious Freedom Award, articulates that concept of religious liberty:
"And here at home, we stand up for the rights of the Evangelical Christian baker or wedding planner threatened with legal sanctions for honoring his or her conscientious belief in marriage as the conjugal union of husband and wife . . ." [1]
Now consider Supreme Court Associate Justice Sotomayor's arguments against Professor George's variety of religious freedom in the following excerpt from her dissent in 303 Creative:
JUSTICE SOTOMAYOR, with whom JUSTICE KAGAN and JUSTICE JACKSON join, dissenting.
Five years ago, this Court recognized the “general rule” that religious and philosophical objections to gay marriage “do not allow business owners and other actors in the economy and in society to deny protected persons equal access to goods and services under a neutral and generally applicable public accommodations law.” Masterpiece Cakeshop, Ltd. v. Colorado Civil Rights Comm’n, 584 U. S. ___, ___ (2018) (slip op., at 9). The Court also recognized the “serious stigma” that would result if “purveyors of goods and services who object to gay marriages for moral and religious reasons” were “allowed to put up signs saying ‘no goods or services will be sold if they will be used for gay marriages.’” Id., at ___ (slip op., at 12).
Today, the Court, for the first time in its history, grants a business open to the public a constitutional right to refuse to serve members of a protected class. Specifically, the Court holds that the First Amendment exempts a website-design company from a state law that prohibits the company from denying wedding websites to same-sex couples if the company chooses to sell those websites to the public. The Court also holds that the company has a right to post a notice that says, “‘no [wedding websites] will be sold if they will be used for gay marriages.’”
“What a difference five years makes.” Carson v. Makin, 596 U. S. ___, ___ (2022) (SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting) (slipop., at 5). And not just at the Court. Around the country, there has been a backlash to the movement for liberty and equality for gender and sexual minorities. New forms of inclusion have been met with reactionary exclusion. This is heartbreaking. Sadly, it is also familiar. When the civil rights and women’s rights movements sought equality in public life, some public establishments refused. Some even claimed, based on sincere religious beliefs, constitutional rights to discriminate. The brave Justices who once sat on this Court decisively rejected those claims.
Now the Court faces a similar test. A business open to the public seeks to deny gay and lesbian customers the full and equal enjoyment of its services based on the owner’s religious belief that same-sex marriages are “false.” The business argues, and a majority of the Court agrees, that because the business offers services that are customized and expressive, the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment shields the business from a generally applicable law that prohibits discrimination in the sale of publicly available goods and services. That is wrong. Profoundly wrong. As I will explain, the law in question targets conduct, not speech, for regulation, and the act of discrimination has never constituted protected expression under the First Amendment. Our Constitution contains no right to refuse service to a disfavored group. I dissent. [2]
That brings me to my question: Whose side is The UnPopulist on?
Does The UnPopulist consider the result in 303 Creative to be an example of the use of "liberal remedies . . . to defend religious liberties and freedom of conscience," or is it, in the words of Justice Sotomayor, "a backlash to the movement for liberty and equality for gender and sexual minorities"?
I'm Jewish. If I were running a kosher deli, I wouldn't make you a ham sandwich. If I operated a gift shop specializing in Judaica, I wouldn't design (or sell) you a crucifix. And I wouldn't demand that a Catholic gift shop make me a pendant featuring a Star of David -- nor would I characterize them as "antisemitic" if they refused.
I'm also gay. If someone's running a bakery or a web-design firm, I have no desire (or need) to force them to express a message that runs counter to their own beliefs. As long as the baker will sell me a generic cake (or other items in his inventory), he's not refusing to do business with me simply because I'm gay.
Then again, not only would I take my wedding project to another vendor; I'd likely take ALL my business elsewhere -- and I'd urge all my friends to do the same (certainly a plausible option in the Denver area, where the Masterpiece Cakeshop was located).
I might even see an opportunity here for a gay person to open a bakery (or an online operation) of their own, and to out-compete the local yokel. In a free society, that's how it works.
In your kosher deli and Judaica gift shop, nobody gets a ham sandwich or crucifix, respectively, so that's not an apt analogy.
Furthermore, a Judaica gift shop, while not a religious institution, is clearly sectarian in character because of its fundamental association with Judaism. In contrast, the baker and web designer did not limit themselves to Christian products and services.
"If someone's running a bakery or a web-design firm, I have no desire (or need) to force them to express a message that runs counter to their own beliefs."
You've got it backwards. But it's necessary to address a larger point first, and that's the idea that 303 Creative was a free speech case. It was not. Here's Justice Sotomayor on that issue:
"The business argues, and a majority of the Court agrees, that because the business offers services that are customized and expressive, the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment shields the business from a generally applicable law that prohibits discrimination in the sale of publicly available goods and services. That is wrong. Profoundly wrong. As I will explain, the law in question targets conduct, not speech, for regulation, and the act of discrimination has never constituted protected expression under the First Amendment."
As I said, you're looking at this backwards. If someone has decided to do business with the public, they have no right to force their religious beliefs on members of the public to such an extent that they won't do business with them. That was what the U.S. Constitution demanded until this case was decided (wrongly, in my view) in 2022.
There was a time not long ago in the greater scheme of things when churches opposed interracial marriage. Let's see how this sounds: "I am a white woman married to a black man. If someone is making wedding cakes and they believe that our interracial marriage runs counter to their religious beliefs, I have no desire (or need) to force them accept our marriage by making one for us."
In a free society, discrimination in public accommodations is repugnant. That's how it works.
If the wedding cake is custom designed (with statements or symbols), that's an expressive act.
We obviously simply disagree on this (and I obviously disagree with Sotomayor, and agree with the majority on the court).
True, the baker and web designer don't indicate that they deal in in Christian specialties. In your formulation, all they'd need to do is indicate (with a sign, or in advertising) that this is the nature of their business -- and if the courts endorsed your view, I suspect that they'd do precisely that (and, in the process, spare me from even considering doing business with them in the first place).
(Moreover, these merchants haven't refused to do business with all gay people; they've merely declined to render a specific sort of statement or design. Such content considerations ALWAYS pay a role when ANY prospective client is shopping for a publicist, ad agency, or [any sort of] designer.)
My dignity as a gay man doesn't depend on bullying anyone into seeing the world as I do, or expressing a message that they don't support. That's simply not how I go about conducting myself in the world.
It's not about who gets to decide that someone else (or what they believe) is "repugnant." I don't need their sodomy laws, but I also don't need to force them to design my website (or my cake) to suit my demands. What goes around comes around.
What's your problem with "Live and let live," anyway? Try it; you might discover that you have more friends than you think -- and you might avoid creating resentment where there's no need to do so.
That's ALSO how it works -- and I don't need a lawyer in order to recognize that.
I'll take snark over resentment, any day. But it's your life to live, and if that's what it takes to make you happy, that's your problem (as long as you don't make it mine).
Disregard my previous comment; it was meant to go elsewhere.
The big problem I see is that Sotomayor doesn’t seem to really acknowledge the Free Exercise Clause, which would seem to be a strong piece of evidence in favor of the majority’s opinion.
Do you know who else didn't really acknowledge the Free Exercise Clause? Justices Gorsuch, Roberts, Thomas, Kavanaugh, Alito and Barrett, the Supreme Court majority who decided the 303 Creative case on the basis of the Free Speech clause of the First Amendment. https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/22pdf/21-476_c185.pdf
Enlightenment liberal democracy isn't perfect, but it's the best the human race has managed yet to do. Just because flawed people haven't lived up to its demands doesn't mean the idea isn't good. When it falls down, work to reform so it gets closer to its promise don't throw it away.
I’ve said this before, but it bears repeating: I don’t know how the UnPopulist can sincerely advocate for “checks-and-balances, separation of powers, executive restraint and representative governance” while defending & being friendly with imperialist neoconservatives like the Cheneys, Anne Applebaum, etc. whose advocacy for the US’ blood-soaked interventions (which have killed ~4.5 million & counting this century alone: https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/05/15/war-on-terror-911-deaths-afghanistan-iraq/) utterly contradicts these principles (https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/cheney-and-constitution). “Transcend[ing] stale left-right tribal entities” is one thing, but if your “allies” are arguably just as bad as your enemies, why bother?
i see a narrative that i have never encountered before: that "socialism" is a "defeated foe" of liberalism. where is that case made, so i can get up to speed?
"We need to transcend stale left-right tribal entities and forge a politics based on a commitment to liberal values"
This was tried before, it was called "fusionism" it led to Trump and MAGA.
The issue isn't a lack of unity among liberals, or something, it's the general political illiteracy.
Without grasping even the basic concepts, like rights and rights-protecting government, itself not possible without understanding the philosophical fundamentals that this is all based on, means any new liberal movement is as doomed to failure as the last attempts.
It's a lack of properly understanding liberal political philosophy that needs to be addressed.
It is true that most people do not understand liberal political philosophy. How would they?
AMAZING ARTICLE.. Sharing everywhere.
Thanks, Glen.
Is anything being recorded?
Yes. We’ll be dropping video as soon as we’re able. Stay tuned.
Great thanks! Would love to hear some of the talks but not able to attend!
It's questionable whether a fixed (or uniformly accepted [or imposed]) notion of "social justice" or "moral progress" can rightfully be demanded as a necessary component of a liberal agenda.
If "we need to transcend stale left-right tribal entities," we'd be well-advised not to open that can of worms.
"The right is deeply upset that progressives today certainly control the commanding heights of cultural institutions. But there are liberal remedies against their excesses—both in the court of law and also through the court of public opinion. Conservatives have already successfully used both to defend religious liberties and freedom of conscience, as David French has convincingly argued."
In today's polarized cultural climate, the phrase "religious liberties" sets my gay thumbs a-pricking that something wicked this way comes. Last year's Supreme Court decision in 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis (600 U.S. 570) was a victory for proponents of a wicked and novel form of so-called religious liberty that can only come at the expense of other people's civil rights. In that case, the Court found that a web designer's religious freedom trumped gay and lesbians' rights under Colorado law to do business with any concern that is open to the general public.
Here is how Princeton's Professor Robert P. George, a seasoned right-wing Catholic anti-gay activist and recipient of the Religious Freedom Institute’s 2023 Defender of Religious Freedom Award, articulates that concept of religious liberty:
"And here at home, we stand up for the rights of the Evangelical Christian baker or wedding planner threatened with legal sanctions for honoring his or her conscientious belief in marriage as the conjugal union of husband and wife . . ." [1]
Now consider Supreme Court Associate Justice Sotomayor's arguments against Professor George's variety of religious freedom in the following excerpt from her dissent in 303 Creative:
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
JUSTICE SOTOMAYOR, with whom JUSTICE KAGAN and JUSTICE JACKSON join, dissenting.
Five years ago, this Court recognized the “general rule” that religious and philosophical objections to gay marriage “do not allow business owners and other actors in the economy and in society to deny protected persons equal access to goods and services under a neutral and generally applicable public accommodations law.” Masterpiece Cakeshop, Ltd. v. Colorado Civil Rights Comm’n, 584 U. S. ___, ___ (2018) (slip op., at 9). The Court also recognized the “serious stigma” that would result if “purveyors of goods and services who object to gay marriages for moral and religious reasons” were “allowed to put up signs saying ‘no goods or services will be sold if they will be used for gay marriages.’” Id., at ___ (slip op., at 12).
Today, the Court, for the first time in its history, grants a business open to the public a constitutional right to refuse to serve members of a protected class. Specifically, the Court holds that the First Amendment exempts a website-design company from a state law that prohibits the company from denying wedding websites to same-sex couples if the company chooses to sell those websites to the public. The Court also holds that the company has a right to post a notice that says, “‘no [wedding websites] will be sold if they will be used for gay marriages.’”
“What a difference five years makes.” Carson v. Makin, 596 U. S. ___, ___ (2022) (SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting) (slipop., at 5). And not just at the Court. Around the country, there has been a backlash to the movement for liberty and equality for gender and sexual minorities. New forms of inclusion have been met with reactionary exclusion. This is heartbreaking. Sadly, it is also familiar. When the civil rights and women’s rights movements sought equality in public life, some public establishments refused. Some even claimed, based on sincere religious beliefs, constitutional rights to discriminate. The brave Justices who once sat on this Court decisively rejected those claims.
Now the Court faces a similar test. A business open to the public seeks to deny gay and lesbian customers the full and equal enjoyment of its services based on the owner’s religious belief that same-sex marriages are “false.” The business argues, and a majority of the Court agrees, that because the business offers services that are customized and expressive, the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment shields the business from a generally applicable law that prohibits discrimination in the sale of publicly available goods and services. That is wrong. Profoundly wrong. As I will explain, the law in question targets conduct, not speech, for regulation, and the act of discrimination has never constituted protected expression under the First Amendment. Our Constitution contains no right to refuse service to a disfavored group. I dissent. [2]
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
That brings me to my question: Whose side is The UnPopulist on?
Does The UnPopulist consider the result in 303 Creative to be an example of the use of "liberal remedies . . . to defend religious liberties and freedom of conscience," or is it, in the words of Justice Sotomayor, "a backlash to the movement for liberty and equality for gender and sexual minorities"?
[1] George, Robert P. "Championing Religious Freedom: ‘We Must Preserve Our Unity’ Going Beyond Political Disputes." National Catholic Register. 4 November 2023. https://www.ncregister.com/commentaries/championing-religious-freedom-rfi-address-2023
[2] Justitia U.S. Supreme Court. Dissent (Sotomayor). 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis, 600 U.S. ___ (2023). https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/600/21-476/#opinions
I'm Jewish. If I were running a kosher deli, I wouldn't make you a ham sandwich. If I operated a gift shop specializing in Judaica, I wouldn't design (or sell) you a crucifix. And I wouldn't demand that a Catholic gift shop make me a pendant featuring a Star of David -- nor would I characterize them as "antisemitic" if they refused.
I'm also gay. If someone's running a bakery or a web-design firm, I have no desire (or need) to force them to express a message that runs counter to their own beliefs. As long as the baker will sell me a generic cake (or other items in his inventory), he's not refusing to do business with me simply because I'm gay.
Then again, not only would I take my wedding project to another vendor; I'd likely take ALL my business elsewhere -- and I'd urge all my friends to do the same (certainly a plausible option in the Denver area, where the Masterpiece Cakeshop was located).
I might even see an opportunity here for a gay person to open a bakery (or an online operation) of their own, and to out-compete the local yokel. In a free society, that's how it works.
Live and let live!
In your kosher deli and Judaica gift shop, nobody gets a ham sandwich or crucifix, respectively, so that's not an apt analogy.
Furthermore, a Judaica gift shop, while not a religious institution, is clearly sectarian in character because of its fundamental association with Judaism. In contrast, the baker and web designer did not limit themselves to Christian products and services.
"If someone's running a bakery or a web-design firm, I have no desire (or need) to force them to express a message that runs counter to their own beliefs."
You've got it backwards. But it's necessary to address a larger point first, and that's the idea that 303 Creative was a free speech case. It was not. Here's Justice Sotomayor on that issue:
"The business argues, and a majority of the Court agrees, that because the business offers services that are customized and expressive, the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment shields the business from a generally applicable law that prohibits discrimination in the sale of publicly available goods and services. That is wrong. Profoundly wrong. As I will explain, the law in question targets conduct, not speech, for regulation, and the act of discrimination has never constituted protected expression under the First Amendment."
As I said, you're looking at this backwards. If someone has decided to do business with the public, they have no right to force their religious beliefs on members of the public to such an extent that they won't do business with them. That was what the U.S. Constitution demanded until this case was decided (wrongly, in my view) in 2022.
There was a time not long ago in the greater scheme of things when churches opposed interracial marriage. Let's see how this sounds: "I am a white woman married to a black man. If someone is making wedding cakes and they believe that our interracial marriage runs counter to their religious beliefs, I have no desire (or need) to force them accept our marriage by making one for us."
In a free society, discrimination in public accommodations is repugnant. That's how it works.
If the wedding cake is custom designed (with statements or symbols), that's an expressive act.
We obviously simply disagree on this (and I obviously disagree with Sotomayor, and agree with the majority on the court).
True, the baker and web designer don't indicate that they deal in in Christian specialties. In your formulation, all they'd need to do is indicate (with a sign, or in advertising) that this is the nature of their business -- and if the courts endorsed your view, I suspect that they'd do precisely that (and, in the process, spare me from even considering doing business with them in the first place).
(Moreover, these merchants haven't refused to do business with all gay people; they've merely declined to render a specific sort of statement or design. Such content considerations ALWAYS pay a role when ANY prospective client is shopping for a publicist, ad agency, or [any sort of] designer.)
My dignity as a gay man doesn't depend on bullying anyone into seeing the world as I do, or expressing a message that they don't support. That's simply not how I go about conducting myself in the world.
It's not about who gets to decide that someone else (or what they believe) is "repugnant." I don't need their sodomy laws, but I also don't need to force them to design my website (or my cake) to suit my demands. What goes around comes around.
What's your problem with "Live and let live," anyway? Try it; you might discover that you have more friends than you think -- and you might avoid creating resentment where there's no need to do so.
That's ALSO how it works -- and I don't need a lawyer in order to recognize that.
OK, Mr. Snark, I'm not wasting any more time on you.
I'll take snark over resentment, any day. But it's your life to live, and if that's what it takes to make you happy, that's your problem (as long as you don't make it mine).
You don’t have a right to the goods & services offered by any specific business. Sorry.
What Justice Sotomayor said.
Disregard my previous comment; it was meant to go elsewhere.
The big problem I see is that Sotomayor doesn’t seem to really acknowledge the Free Exercise Clause, which would seem to be a strong piece of evidence in favor of the majority’s opinion.
Do you know who else didn't really acknowledge the Free Exercise Clause? Justices Gorsuch, Roberts, Thomas, Kavanaugh, Alito and Barrett, the Supreme Court majority who decided the 303 Creative case on the basis of the Free Speech clause of the First Amendment. https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/22pdf/21-476_c185.pdf
I was just making this point!
Enlightenment liberal democracy isn't perfect, but it's the best the human race has managed yet to do. Just because flawed people haven't lived up to its demands doesn't mean the idea isn't good. When it falls down, work to reform so it gets closer to its promise don't throw it away.
https://www.renew-the-republic.com/p/two-and-a-half-cheers-for-america
I’ve said this before, but it bears repeating: I don’t know how the UnPopulist can sincerely advocate for “checks-and-balances, separation of powers, executive restraint and representative governance” while defending & being friendly with imperialist neoconservatives like the Cheneys, Anne Applebaum, etc. whose advocacy for the US’ blood-soaked interventions (which have killed ~4.5 million & counting this century alone: https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/05/15/war-on-terror-911-deaths-afghanistan-iraq/) utterly contradicts these principles (https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/cheney-and-constitution). “Transcend[ing] stale left-right tribal entities” is one thing, but if your “allies” are arguably just as bad as your enemies, why bother?
i see a narrative that i have never encountered before: that "socialism" is a "defeated foe" of liberalism. where is that case made, so i can get up to speed?
time for unity for humanity <3
Would like to write for Unpopulist urgently. How to get through?