I don't think reactionaries have just used the courts to block political
reforms. Rather, there is a tradition of conservative judicial activism which has been rather creative in using the law to enforce ruling class ideas. Think of the way a decision like Plessy Vs. Ferguson conjured out of nothing the idea of "seperate but equal" as a rationale for Jim Crow. (As I understand it, Jim Crow was itself a novel phenonomeon in the 1870s and 1880s). Another example would be how conservative justice applied the 14th
amendment to protect corporations, despite the fact that this goes against
the "original intent" of the law. My point is that liberals and leftist don't need to masochistically berate themselves for judicial activism, when in fact the larger history of the U.S. is that the law is usually on the side of the ruling class.
Jeet
--
Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University michael at ecst.csuchico.edu Chico, CA 95929 530-898-5321 fax 530-898-5901