Four Ways A Romney Supreme Court Would Change The Constitution Without Amending It

In an interview with the Columbus Dispatch yesterday, GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney brushed off a suggestion that he would usher in a constitutional amendment overruling Roe v. Wade, stating that “[t]hat’s not where America is now.” That does not mean, however, that Romney will not usher in massive changes to the Constitution if he is given the opportunity to name new Supreme Court justices. Here are just four ways that Romney’s appointees would vote to effectively rewrite the Constitution if given the chance to do so:

• Eliminating The Right To An Abortion: Roe v. Wade is already on life support. The Court’s current majority weakened the longstanding rule ensuring that women may terminate pregnancies that threaten their health, claiming instead that a federal abortion restriction should be allowed in part because “some women come to regret” their own reproductive choices. If Romney were able to add an additional conservative to the Supreme Court, Roe would likely be forfeit.

• Judges For Sale: Romney named Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Scalia, Thomas and Alito as his models should he be allowed to pick new judges. All four said the Supreme Court should have done nothing when a wealthy coal baron payed $3 million to place a sympathetic justice on the West Virginia Supreme Court. That justice then cast the key vote to overrule a $50 million verdict against the coal baron’s company. Romney may even want his justices to go much further in permitting the very wealthy to buy elections — he previously endorsed allowing billionaires to give unlimited sums of money directly to his campaign.

• Government In The Bedroom: Only five of the Supreme Court’s current justices joined the landmark Lawrence v. Texas decision, which struck down Texas’ “sodomy” laws and held that the government cannot “demean” a couple by “making their private sexual conduct a crime.” An additional conservative justice would place Lawrence in jeopardy.

• Tossing Out The Constitution’s Text: As a top conservative judge who received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from George W. Bush once explained, the legal case against the Affordable Care Act has no basis “in either the text of the U.S. Constitution or Supreme Court precedent.” Romney would appoint more justices who embrace this lawless legal theory.

Four of the Court’s current justices are over the age of 74.