Justice Anthony Kennedy’s retirement announcement was not unexpected but is still major news in the direction and leadership of the country.
Kennedy spent more than 30 years on the Court and for much of that time, particularly the last decade, has been the deciding or “swing” vote on so many controversies, ranging from campaign finance to gay marriage, the Second Amendment to abortion. Throughout that time, his judicial philosophy couldn’t be pigeonholed as “conservative” or “liberal,” and indeed is hard to describe in conventional terms. Most terms he agreed with Cato’s position more than any other justice and so he’s also sometimes known as the Court’s “libertarian” justice. There’s some truth to that, even though he often reached results that libertarians liked for reasons that sounded in dignity and civility rather than classical-liberal or natural-rights theory.
Kennedy was the strongest defender of the First Amendment that the Court has probably ever seen, whether in the context of political or artistic expression made by students, workers, or any citizens. He was also a careful guarantor of the Constitution’s structural protections for liberty. Whether federalism, the separation of powers, or any of the other “less sexy” parts of constitutional design, he recognized that they were there as a means to protect and secure our liberties, not as a dry technical exercise.
Read more at https://www.cato.org/blog/justice-kennedys-retirement-leaves-big-gap-heralds-major-shift-supreme-court
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