The story of Terri Schiavo's life and death is one of extreme tragedy and sadness, of a young woman cut down in the prime of her life, before she could even think to write her final wishes. It is a tale told in tears, about a family tragedy that, unfortunately, plays itself out in thousands of iterations across the country (and the world) every year.
What differentiates Schiavo's case from those like it is the amount of attention it has received from Florida Governor Jeb Bush and, lately, his brother President Bush and the United States Congress. Unfortunately, the brothers Bush and their Republican peers in both the Florida Legislative and the Congress seem to have abandoned any respect for the separation of powers in favor of pursuing an extreme, unconstitutional and ultimately unworkable solution to one family's personal problem.
The latest actions, taken last week by Congress to force the case into the Federal court system, should be especially troubling to anyone who believes that an independent judiciary is essential to a true democracy. In our system, legislators represent people and make laws, while judges interpret how those laws apply. The reason why so many judges across the country (including those in state systems) are appointed is so that they will be insulated from political pressure. It is not their job to respond to popular pressure; it is their job to judge the laws.
We have heard much talk in the past few weeks about the lack of judicial responsiveness to popular demands. Much of this talk has come from the GOP side of the aisle, and it demonstrates a fundamental lack of understanding of the function of the judiciary. Our independent judiciary has made many unpopular decisions that have proven essential to the progress of this country: witness, for example, the extraordinary impact of Brown v. Board, which desegregated our nation's schools and put America on the path towards integration.
The GOP-led congress took the unusual step of trying to bypass the state judiciary in order to achieve its desired outcome. Fortunately for the integrity of our constitution, every court that heard the case affirmed the judgment of the state court. Even though our legislators showed themselves to be of dubious integrity, our judges held strong and did their job, in spite of enormous and inappropriate political pressure.
It is also extremely troubling to see these politicians (led by the President and the Republican leadership) making political hay out of what is a sad story for the Schiavo and Schindler families. The President used the occasion to point out that this country must support a "culture of life," while Majority Leader Tom DeLay resorted to ad hominem attacks on Schiavo's husband and guardian Michael Schiavo.
Here we have a President who sees no problem speaking of a culture of life while presiding over 152 executions in six years as governor of Texas. We have another Texan, DeLay, lecturing us on Christian values by attacking a man in the midst of a horrible situation. The final outcome in Schiavo's case is no longer material; it seems that, perhaps, it never really was.
