What Standard?

The Story

It was twenty-nine years ago.  Clarence Thomas was nominated for the Supreme Court by Republican President George HW Bush to succeed liberal icon Thurgood Marshall.  Thomas, like Marshall, was African-American,  but that’s where the similarities ended.  He was an “arch-conservative,” a “literalist” when it came to the Constitution.  Thomas saw much of the social progress made by the Supreme Court since the 1950’s as Constitutionally unfounded.

Joe Biden was the Democratic Senator from Delaware, and Chairman of the Judiciary Committee.  The Committee held extensive hearings on Thomas, dramatically questioning his libertarian views and particularly his thoughts on abortion rights.   The committee hearings concluded and the nomination was sent to the Senate floor for debate. Then Thomas’s former assistant, Anita Hill, came forward claiming that he sexual harassed her.  Biden reopened Committee hearings.

The entire nation watched, riveted by Hill’s testimony.  It was, for the time, shocking; with discussion of pubic hairs on Coke cans and the “Long Dong Silver.”   After the first day was over, Hill had other witnesses prepared to back her statements.  But Biden did not call them.  Instead, Clarence Thomas presented his supporting witnesses.  The Committee ultimately sent his nomination back to the full Senate without recommendation.

In an era when Presidents were given wide latitude to choose their Justices, Thomas was confirmed by the Democrat controlled Senate, 52 to 48.  Eleven Democrats voted for Thomas, two Republicans voted against him.

Man of the Time

Today we see those hearings in the reflection of the recent the Kavanaugh debacle.  The same tensions and emotions swept the room, and the Senators were faced with a similar “he said/she said” situation.

Joe Biden is running for President of the United States in 2020.  In today’s incredibly partisan atmosphere, it is easy to look back and say that he could and should have stopped the Thomas nomination.  Certainly if Democrats controlled the Senate in 2018, Kavanaugh wouldn’t be on the Supreme Court today.  We are in the era of #METOO; our society has determined that sexual harassment is unacceptable.  It should have been that way in 1990 as well, but it wasn’t. Anita Hill’s actions started to change the world.  Joe Biden was a man of that time.

Evaluating History

When we examine Joe Biden’s fitness for office, what standards do we apply to his actions in the Thomas hearings, or the 1994 Crime Bill, or all of the other votes he took in his forty plus year career?  Do we impose today’s #METOO standards and condemn Biden for not living up to them? Or, do we allow politicians to grow, and change, and learn, just as we have ourselves?

I’m not a committed supporter of Joe Biden for the Democratic nomination.  There are many other candidates, and some are more closely aligned to my beliefs.  As Democratic National Chairman Tom Perez is fond of saying, “…find a candidate who wins your heart, then follow the one who wins the nomination with your head.”   I will vote my heart in the primary here in Ohio, then support the nominee.

But I do think the Democratic Party needs to be fair.  It’s easy for some of those with little or no records to attack Vice President Biden for stands he made in different eras.  He’s had a lengthy career, and there’s plenty of “targets” for attack. And certainly Biden is responsible for his positions of the 70’s, 80’s 90’s and 00’s.  But those votes and stands can’t be ripped out of the context of their times and they shouldn’t be judged solely by today’s values. 

Outing the President

Do you remember Joe Biden’s stand on gay marriage?  In 2012 as Vice President, he told David Gregory on Meet the Press  that he was:

 “…absolutely comfortable with the fact that men marrying men, women marrying women, and heterosexual men marrying women are entitled to the same exact rights. All the civil rights, all the civil liberties. And quite frankly I don’t see much of a distinction beyond that.”

This was before President Obama came out for gay marriage rights and before the Supreme Court decision affirming the right of marriage to gay couples.  This seemed way ahead of the norm.  And it was only seven years ago.

Pitfalls of Purity

One of the “super powers” given to Donald Trump is his ability to use the speed with which our society changed.  Whether it’s LGBTQ equality, or #METOO, or the first black President; our world changed faster than many were ready for.  It’s not that the change was “wrong.”  It’s that many felt left behind, a feeling that Trump has managed to tap into with “Make America Great Again.”  

Democrats need to be wary of “purity.”  If we demand that our candidates be “pure” to the standards of today for their actions decades ago, we create an impossible standard.  We then are limited to picking candidates with little record to discuss, a mistake the Republican Party made in 2016.  This week in particular they must be regretting that decision.

Democrats will limit themselves to Styer and Yang, Buttigieg and Williamson.  And while of those, Buttigieg may have won my political “heart,” Democrats should not destroy those with a past in order to achieve a present purity.  It’s that kind of thinking that will lead to a second term for the worst President in American history.