An activist dressed in a costume inspired by Margaret Atwood’s “The Handmaid’s Tale” and protesting outside the home of Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett insisted that Barrett had no idea of what it was like to give birth.
Barrett has five biological children and has adopted two more children.
Accompanied by six other women dressed in “Handmaid’s Tale” outfits as they circled the cul-de-sac around Barrett’s home, the woman preached to a reporter, “She’s Catholic. Catholic is letting their religious doctrine interfere with their ability to write sound legal doctrine. It’s also possible that the fact that she is an adoptive mother is influencing her inability to see what it’s like to carry a pregnancy to term.”
“Well, she’s had five kids by herself,” the reporter pointed out.
Cornered, the activist switched gears: “Not everybody wants to have five kids or four kids or one kid.”
“Not all Catholics are anti-choice,” the activist pronounced, ignoring the distinction between Catholics who observe traditional Catholic doctrine and those who don’t. “So it would make no sense to protest an entire religion.”
“Again, nobody should be ashamed of their religion, nobody should not be Catholic,” she patronized.
Another woman carrying a sign reading “Keep your rosaries off my ovaries” chimed in, “We have no issue with Catholicism. However in this country, there’s a separation of church and state. So somebody’s religion, no matter what that might be, cannot dictate how they carry out their job as a public official.”
Handmaid's Tale is at Justice Amy Coney Barrett’s home. pic.twitter.com/mCQrrgo4Lt
— Virginia Allen (@Virginia_Allen5) May 11, 2022
The energy is markedly more negative outside Kavanaugh’s house. The anger has become much more palpable than outside any other justices’ house. pic.twitter.com/zY2OY34hcA
— Douglas Blair (@DouglasKBlair) May 8, 2022
Justices Brett Kavanaugh and Samuel Alito have also had protests outside of their homes. One of Barrett’s neighbors told Fox News that the Barretts were “scared, and they wanted prayers,” adding, “The whole neighborhood’s been supportive of that.”
Daniel L. Dreisbach, the author of “Thomas Jefferson and the Wall of Separation Between Church and State,” has explained in a comprehensive essay that the famed “wall of separation” between church and state cited in the 1947 case Everson v. Board of Education was a stretch from the original intent of President Thomas Jefferson’s use of the phrase in his 1802 letter to the Baptist Association of Danbury, Connecticut.
“Throughout his public career, including two terms as President, Jefferson pursued policies incompatible with the ‘high and impregnable’ wall the modern Supreme Court has erroneously attributed to him,” Dreisbach noted. “For example, he endorsed the use of federal funds to build churches and to support Christian missionaries working among the Indians.”
“Jefferson’s wall, as a matter of federalism, was erected between the national and state governments on matters pertaining to religion and not, more generally, between the church and all civil government,” Dreisbach continued. “In other words, Jefferson placed the federal government on one side of his wall and state governments and churches on the other.”
“The differences between the two walls are suggested by Jefferson’s record as a public official in both Virginia and the nation, which shows that he initiated practices and implemented policies inconsistent with Justice Black’s and the modern Supreme Court’s ‘high and impregnable’ wall of separation,” Dreisbach stated.
Pointing out that Jefferson’s use of the phrase was metaphorical, Dreisbach concluded, “The wall is politically divisive. Because it is so concrete and unyielding, its very invocation forecloses meaningful dialogue regarding the prudential and constitutional role of religion, faith communities, and religious citizens in public life.”