Today in Supreme Court History: August 26, 1964

8/26/1964: Lyndon B. Johnson nominated as Democratic candidate for president. He would make two appointments to the Supreme Court: Justices Abe Fortas and Thurgood Marshall.

President Johnson's appointees to the Supreme Court

Comments

[AmosArch]

I'll have them n**&%^S voting Democratic for the next two hundred years!~Classic quotes from Progressive History #343436188

[Sarcastr0]

Not an actual quote.

LBJ was a sonuvabitch, but if you read the Caro series, it's pretty clear he was into civil rights and the Great Society for reason of morality.

I know it's hard for the right to allow a reality wherein someone on the left doing something out of principle, but that's the current thinking.

Maybe the policies have bad outcomes, but all evidence points away from their being some pay-for-votes scheme.

[Krychek_2]

Not only that, ending Jim Crow lost the Democrats the South, and they knew at the time that was a possibility. I'm trying to think of an example of a situation in which the Republicans similarly stood on principle even though it cost them politically and I'm not coming up with anything.

[Sarcastr0]

They're all cool with the New Deal, but the moment something includes nonwhites...well, it's the end of America.

[Á àß äẞç ãþÇđ âÞ¢Đæ ǎB€Ðëf ảhf]

Oh hell. I mistakenly flagged your comment, so here it is:

Not only that, ending Jim Crow lost the Democrats the South, and they knew at the time that was a possibility. I’m trying to think of an example of a situation in which the Republicans similarly stood on principle even though it cost them politically and I’m not coming up with anything.

The "principle" which you seem to be so proud of is the principle of "Great Father knows best, and the masses shall obey" -- there is nothing majestic about that, nothing to be enamored of, unless you too think you know better than everybody else what is good for them.

As for Republicans, if you think they too have any other principle, or no principle, you are mistaken. Their principle is exactly the same -- they know best.

Politics is just which know-it-all wins, which one gets the fun of stomping over individual rights.

[Sarcastr0]

This is nigh-tautological. Absent hard-core Buddhists, all principles contain within them their own validity - the idea that it's adherents know best.

Krychek_2 is talking about taking a political move that risks some of your constituency. That's a rarer, braver thing. The 1972 Democratic convention reforms was another such move.

Arguably the GOP's decision not to abide by the reforms suggested by their 2012 postmortem is another, but the principles involved don't seem like ones to be too proud of.

[Á àß äẞç ãþÇđ âÞ¢Đæ ǎB€Ðëf ảhf]

The Great Society and the New Deal and all other Progressive programs were and are based on nannyism, paternalism, call it what you will: the principle that the masses are too damned naive, gullible, ignorant, and just plain dumb to look out for themselves, and it is both duty and right for their elite masters to guide them.

There is no other Progressive principle, and never has been. It is the Jim Crow principle, the eugenics principle, the affirmative action principle, the FYTW principle, the we-know-better-than-you principle.

Individual rights? Fah! *sweeps that aside* I know what is best for you, you stupid little people. Eat your porridge and shut up.

[Sarcastr0]

You blame those starving in the Great Depression for not looking out for themselves? The elderly eating cat food? Those bankrupted due to medical bills?

A social safety net is not paternalism; it's humanity.

[Á àß äẞç ãþÇđ âÞ¢Đæ ǎB€Ðëf ảhf]

Its implementation was shoddy and guided by power politics, not any kind of actual interest. Why do you think the New Deal prolonged the depression, and why Hoover's similar fussing did the same?

The idea that "good intentions with bad results" is any kind of principle shows the bankruptcy of statism. Your excuses for it are disgusting.

Your claim that I blame starving people for their starvation is about all I'd expect from a political hack who thinks good intentions are the only principle worth its salt.

[Sarcastr0]

The idea that the New Deal prolonged the depression is a...minority view, to say the least. It's also a counterfactual and so kind of silly to build a factual narrative around.

You also mistake me. As I noted below, 'intentions and outcomes are separate moral debates.' I did not say outcomes don't matter; quite the opposite in fact.

the principle that the masses are too damned naive, gullible, ignorant, and just plain dumb to look out for themselves looks to me a lot like you are blaming starving people for their starvation, and asking that they look out for themselves.
Happy to be wrong; please clarify.

[Á àß äẞç ãþÇđ âÞ¢Đæ ǎB€Ðëf ảhf]

I didn't say that you said outcomes don't matter. I said you think intentions matter. You are wrong.

The only people who think Hoover and FDR did not prolong the depression are, to use the current fad word, deniers. It is not a minority opinion except among political hacks.

[Á àß äẞç ãþÇđ âÞ¢Đæ ǎB€Ðëf ảhf]

"Maybe the policies have bad outcomes, but ...." pretty much sums up all political programs. To call LBJ moral is to justify intentions over outcomes. Same nonsense that justifies looting, vandalism, and arson in the name of social justice.

No thanks.

[Sarcastr0]

Intentions and outcomes are separate moral debates. AmosArch was clearly speaking about intentions.

[Á àß äẞç ãþÇđ âÞ¢Đæ ǎB€Ðëf ảhf]

It was you I quoted. "Good intentions but ..."

You can't back out of it now. Your guiding principle is good intentions above good outcomes.

[Sarcastr0]

No, I was responding to AmosArch's ridiculous scenario.

My name-checking outcomes was an attempt to head off any discussion of outcomes as irrelevant. Which is quite clearly how that sentence reads.

[Á àß äẞç ãþÇđ âÞ¢Đæ ǎB€Ðëf ảhf]

Not clearly at all, since you have now spent several comments re-interpreting it.

[WJack]

The Johnson administration marked the beginning of the end of the greatest country ever. If you have any doubt take a look at your tv this pm.

[Sarcastr0]

What is the connection between LBJ and BLM?

[Á àß äẞç ãþÇđ âÞ¢Đæ ǎB€Ðëf ảhf]

Good intentions and bad outcomes. Can't you recognize your own principle, or have you forgotten it already?

[Sarcastr0]

WJack is drawing a causal connection. mad_kalak seems to agree. I don't see it.

As noted above, I've never said that good intentions obviate bad outcomes. You have misread.

[Á àß äẞç ãþÇđ âÞ¢Đæ ǎB€Ðëf ảhf]

I never said you said that.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Do the Volokh Conspirators ever wonder why their blog attracts so many bigots?

Do their employers?

What about the hiring committees at strong law schools, which are sometimes asked (by movement conservatives) to hire more movement conservatives?

[Dan Schiavetta]

A dirty politician who used his wiles for good purposes that he knew would hurt him. In politics that’s rare.

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

The Republicans continued their half-century-old Southern Strategy this evening by having a member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans sing the national anthem to close this evening’s segment of the Republican convention.

Which part of American history inclines conservatives to believe that bigots can prevail in America? Better Americans have overcome successive waves of ignorance and intolerance throughout American history, and this latest batch of bigots seems nothing special.

As America improves and in a world in which whites will soon not constitute a majority in America, the Republican Party must change or die,

I vote “die.” See you at the polls, clingers.