Polls consistently show a majority of the American public in support of abortion rights and against the overturning of Roe v. Wade, yet, with the astonishing news last night, we appear to be on the precipice of abortion becoming illegal in most of the states in the Union. The laws already in place—or to be triggered immediately after Roe is struck down—are not mere “abortion bans,” but cruel exactions, intended to criminalize and punish women. How is this possible in a democratic nation of millions? The Conservative Movement played the long game and worked tirelessly, for decades, on controlling the least democratic of our constitutional institutions: a council of nine lifetime-appointed judges.
Yet there’s still plenty of blame to go around. Democratic-controlled legislatures have failed to codify abortion rights as positive law, despite the public’s support for it. For decades, they have left the fate of the country in the hands of a tiny minority they hoped would behave cautiously and wisely, according to certain notions of legitimacy. The last 7 years should tell us all we need to know about “certain notions of legitimacy.”
We like to imagine democracy dying in a dramatic coup, a successful version of January 6, but conservatives, true to their name, prefer to wield power through the oldest and most hallowed forms of oligarchy rather than through rowdy demagogues. We’re now asked to politely ignore that they accomplished their majority in this august body through two elections where their candidates received a minority of the vote: one which was practically stolen through legal wrangling in the very same court and the other where their candidate was clearly an aspirant dictator and would-be destroyer of the constitutional order they supposedly cherish. There is absolutely no norm or precedent they feel obliged to respect in the pursuit of power, but when the shoe is on the other foot, they intone gravely about the need for legitimacy and “respecting our institutions.”
But it’s the legitimacy of our institutions that are at stake now, as they have been all along in this slow-motion crisis that’s been developing for decades. If the Court loses all pretense careful and reasoned in its use of its authority and is laid-bare as just a partisan tool, how can we expect the public to respect its rulings? And if the legislature refuses to govern and enact the will of the majority, where will the outraged energy of the public be directed? Under these fetters, a democratic nation will writhe in agony. If our institutions only deliver perversity or futility, who knows then what a population, driven mad with frustration with a broken and impossible system, will support? We’ve already seen one figure emerge who superficially promised the reassertion of popular democracy while almost delivering its death. It is absolutely imperative that some real political party or politician can actually now deliver what the public wants, or someone will come along again in short oder who offers to put our democracy out of its misery—permanently.
I 99% reject Rome-USA comparisons but the one that I’ve found useful to keep in mind for myself is that Sulla’s dictatorship happened about 30 years before Caesar became dictator, very similar conquest with about the same underlying causes. And Roman institutions bounced back for a while afterward! But Sulla’s dictatorship changed what felt possible, elevated generals, introduced civil war. Feel like a lot of people are looking for a Rubicon moment but I think Sulla suggests the time and damage it takes to get to them - even catastrophes that aren’t fully realized can lead to worse.
This is something that stood out from your post:
"The Conservative Movement played the long game and worked tirelessly, for decades"
The conservative movement strategized and hacked and chiseled and dug as if it was fighting for its survival, while the rest of us effectively assumed our majority would naturally and automatically triumph. And now we've arrived at this dissonant reality where the majority indeed dominates western culture, while the conservative movement dominates US politics.
The two are not just dissonant but increasingly in real conflict (see Florida vs Disney). I don't foresee a scenario where a broad political coalition forms to combat what conservatives are doing, because the range of viewpoints across the majority is too diverse and irreconcilable, even when we agree on specific issues.
Instead I think there will be more and more battle lines drawn between culture and politics, and these will be the domains that each side weaponizes against the other. Unfortunately that has never gone very well for the 'culture' side, because the state has tanks and guns.