Katherine Stewart writes:

The shape of the Christian nationalist movement in the post-Roe future is coming into view, and it should terrify anyone concerned for the future of constitutional democracy.

The Supreme Court’s decision to rescind the reproductive rights that American women have enjoyed over the past half-century will not lead America’s homegrown religious authoritarians to retire from the culture wars and enjoy a sweet moment of triumph. On the contrary, movement leaders are already preparing for a new and more brutal phase of their assault on individual rights and democratic self-governance. Breaking American democracy isn’t an unintended side effect of Christian nationalism. It is the point of the project.

A good place to gauge the spirit and intentions of the movement that brought us the radical majority on the Supreme Court is the annual Road to Majority Policy Conference. At this year’s event, which took place last month in Nashville, three clear trends were in evidence. First, the rhetoric of violence among movement leaders appeared to have increased significantly from the already alarming levels I had observed in previous years. Second, the theology of dominionism — that is, the belief that “right-thinking” Christians have a biblically derived mandate to take control of all aspects of government and society — is now explicitly embraced. And third, the movement’s key strategists were giddy about the legal arsenal that the Supreme Court had laid at their feet as they anticipated the overturning of Roe v. Wade. [Continue reading…]

Nina Totenberg writes:

There is simply no way to overstate what the Supreme Court did this term. No journalist or scholar alive can remember a term with so many earthquakes in the law.

The data tell the story. The court produced more conservative decisions this term than at any time since 1931, according to statistics compiled by professors Lee Epstein of Washington University in St. Louis and Keven Quinn of the University of Michigan.

In an astounding 62% of the decisions, conservatives prevailed, and more importantly, often prevailed in dramatic ways.

The sweeping nature of the court’s decisions, and the sheer number of them amounted to a dream fulfilled for hard-line conservatives and a nightmare for liberals and moderates. [Continue reading…]