“How dare you attack the physical appearance of another person,” fumed Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, after GOP Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene criticized the appearance of another female House committee member. Greene’s statement might have had racial overtones.

Greene had lashed out against a colleague’s eyelashes and Ocasio-Cortez’s retort, dissing Greene’s figure, both crossed a “redline” of acceptable behavior. However strong their partisanship, members of Congress traditionally have stayed away from personally attacking their opponents based on their appearance, race, age or religion.

A “redline” is supposed to serve as a warning: if you cross the line, you risk suffering adverse consequences. Hence, the relatively minor House committee exchange.

The idea is that you “draw a line in the sand” that is the acceptable limit. It’s a poor analogy, because, given the softness of sand, that line is increasingly and easily blown away.

In the late 1940s, Arthur Vandenberg was a Republican senator during Democratic President Harry Truman’s administration. While he might oppose Truman’s foreign policy, he asserted that Congress should unite behind the policy once adopted and make it bipartisan. “Politics stops at the water’s edge,” he said. That was a redline.

Recently, New York Republican Rep. Elise Stefanik addressed the Israeli parliament, the Knesset, to criticize President Biden’s Israel-Gaza positions. She is a member of House leadership and an ardent supporter of Donald Trump. Vandenberg’s redline crossed.

Her party’s once and hopeful president shows no restraint in attacking the policies of other American political leaders while abroad. He sees the world as his campaign stage and does not worry that a lack of foreign policy continuity, even allowing for its evolution, is essential for maintaining confidence in the U.S. For him, politics does not stop at the water’s edge.

When political leaders adopt no-redlines policies, the effect can get out of hand. People can take politicians’ wild admonitions as permission or even encouragement for taking physical action. A federal court may someday get to decide if the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection responded to Trump’s call to “fight like hell.”

Members of Congress, judges, prosecutors and witnesses are now physically threatened. If the operation of the federal system is pushed aside by threats or injury caused by a relative few incensed about a decision, it is also endangered. That system is not perfect, but it has rules, the redlines all have agreed to observe to protect officials.

The bias of Florida federal District Court Judge Aileen Cannon toward Trump is so evident that it is embarrassing to her and the judiciary. The people rely on courts to provide at least the appearance of not taking sides between the parties. But her efforts to excessively complicate and delay the Trump documents retention case destroy any such impartiality.

Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito’s home flew an American flag upside down at the time of the Capitol insurrection. That intended political support for Trump is likely illegal under the Flag Code and raises doubts about his fairness in political cases. He blamed it on his wife, a claim that insults people’s intelligence and cannot pass the straight-face test.

His apologists resort to whataboutism, claiming that Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg opposed candidate Trump before the 2016 election. Assuming that’s true, two wrongs still don’t make a right to wipe out an established redline against the appearance of bias.

Before that same election, a tape revealed Trump’s having groped women, feeling his celebrity gave him license. Surprisingly even to him, society’s redline against such behavior was swept away by millions of voters.

The U.S. House Speaker heads a cornerstone institution of the federal government. Part of the Speaker’s job is to maintain the dignity and stature of the House, independent of the Senate and president. But Speaker Mike Johnson dashed to New York to stand in the street supporting Trump in a New York State trial. Redline gone.

Given the power, role and influence of the president, candidates and incumbents have for decades made their full medical and tax records public. Trump never did either and the media took note and simply moved on. Trump and Biden, for his medical data, have given themselves a free ride. Redline deathbed?

Customs have grown up to make the bare bones of constitutional government work. Over time, these customs take the form of the redlines around the behavior of the people who operate that government. When redlines can be crossed without any penalty, the essential understandings that allow a political system to operate across a vast territory and population can be lost.

Of course, customs and redlines must evolve as the world changes. What was once not allowed can become acceptable. But this evolution must continue to protect or enhance the people’s rights. If it is abrupt, arbitrary or self-serving, crossing redlines leads to more authoritarian government.

Gordon L. Weil formerly wrote for the Washington Post and other newspapers, served on the U.S. Senate and EU staffs, headed Maine state agencies and was a Harpswell selectman. 

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