Wednesday, December 19, 2012

Bork to the Future


(Just a short prelude to 2013 and farewell to what came before.)

I confess that the first column I ever wrote, twenty-five years ago, was called "Bork to the Future."

It was not so much a defense of the specific policy views of the now-deceased Judge Robert Bork (he was basically a majoritarian and I'm an individualist, long story short) but a reaction to the hysteria over his nomination to the Supreme Court.

He wanted judges to defer to the original intent of the Constitution -- no longer nearly as controversial an idea -- and that humble notion probably looms much larger in the minds of the public generally and libertarians specifically than it did back in 1987 (and so a page is turned in the long-count calendar of political philosophy).

In fact, that notion will be a big influence on my blog and (if all goes as planned) at the DIONYSIUM in January, when I blog of Bastiat's The Law, Judge Napolitano's Theodore and Woodrow, and David Friedman's work in progress Legal Systems Very Different from Ours -- and as we debate judicial activism's pros and cons at Muchmore's on January 14.

This, surely, will be an occasion to do the mature thing and learn rather than having a simple yes/no fight. (But we'll see how it goes.)

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