ELLSWORTH – Many Mainers believe there is a real disconnect between Constitution Avenue and Main Street. The nomination of Solicitor General Elena Kagan to the U.S. Supreme Court by President Obama is another example of that divide.

The Supreme Court nominee wrote, “In our own times, a coherent socialist movement is nowhere to be found in the United States. Americans are more likely to speak of a golden past than of a golden future, of capitalism’s glories than of socialism’s greatness.”

In her thesis, “To the Final Conflict: Socialism in New York City, 1900-1933,” Kagan wrote: “The (Socialist Party) story is a sad but also chastening one for those who still wish to change America.”

The idea that socialism is “golden” and America’s capitalism needs to “change” is what motivated me to jump in a car with a fellow English teacher, travel to Washington and meet with the staffs of Sens. Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins as well as senators on the Judiciary Committee.

National Sovereignty: As dean of Harvard Law School, Ms. Kagan removed the Constitutional Law course as a requirement for graduation and replaced it with a course in International Law.

It baffles the minds of Mainers and citizens across our nation that an institution such as Harvard does not require its lawyers to take constitutional law. To Elena Kagan, socialism is “great” while constitutional law is expendable.

Sanctity of Life: Elena Kagan’s disconnect with most Americans can be seen in her support for taxpayer-funded abortions, partial-birth abortion, assisted suicide and human cloning.

Though recognizing that “a select panel convened by (the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists) could identify no circumstances under which (partial birth abortion) would be the only option to save the life or preserve the health of the woman,” she advised President Bill Clinton to veto Congress’ ban on this inhumane process.

As a domestic policy adviser in the Clinton White House, Kagan wrote that a new federal law banning assisted suicide would be “a fairly terrible idea.”

Kagan’s radical views on the “un-sanctity” of life go all the way to supporting human cloning for research.

I have two sons with Type 1 diabetes. No one wants a cure more than me, but not at the expense and exploitation of another human life.

Homosexual Marriage: Every time Americans have voted on the issue of homosexual marriage, they have sounded a resounding “no.” In fact, citizens in 30 states have now added amendments to their state constitutions defining marriage as between one man and one woman.

Many Americans are concerned that Kagan will do on the Supreme Court what judges did in Iowa, Vermont and Massachusetts, and make homosexual marriage the law of the land.

Judicial Activism: The concern that Elena Kagan is more an activist than a jurist is a legitimate one. She says her “judicial hero” is Aharon Barak of Israel. “He is the judge who has best advanced democracy, human rights, the rule of law and justice,” she said.

Aharon Barak is an internationally famous judicial activist who wrote in his book “The Judge in a Democracy” that “The judge may give a statute new meaning, a dynamic meaning that seeks to bridge the gap between law and life’s changing reality without changing the statute itself. The statute remains as it was, but its meaning changes, because the court has given it a new meaning that suits new social needs.”

We need to sound the alarm over Kagan’s potential approval in the Senate. Supreme Court nominations are lifetime appointments. America’s history for the next several decades is at stake. Tell our senators that you do not support the confirmation of Elena Kagan to the Supreme Court.

Then, ask God to once again “bless America, land that I love.”

 

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