If there was ever evidence that the present Supreme Court needs change badly to a more balanced view of issues, the 5-4 decision today denying convicts the constitutional right to have DNA evidence utilized for the possibility to show they were wrongly convicted, provides definite proof of the tragedy of so many conservative appointments by Reagan and the two Bush Presidents.Â
Justice Anthony Kennedy, the swing vote who sometimes votes with the four liberals, but more often votes with the four conservatives on the Court, sided with the right on this case, despite the fact that Chief Justice Roberts said that he understood that in some cases, this could free convicts wrongly convicted, with new DNA evidence not available when they came to trial. The case involved the state of Alaska, which does not, along with some other states, mandate that new evidence can be used to free a wrongfully convicted prisoner. The Court used the issue of states rights to say that it is up to each state how they deal with this matter.
This decision is wrong, tragic, outrageous, and leads us down the conservative path of promoting states rights, despite the long history of many state governments in the past discriminating against some citizens based on race, religion, ethnicity, or economic circumstance. Apparently, the present Court does not pay attention to history, or is ignorant of history. The majority of Chief Justice Roberts, and Associate Justices Kennedy, Scalia, Thomas, and Alito should be ashamed of themselves. Hopefully, some change will come in the next decade to correct the distortion of the Constitution that the present majority of the Court has led us into, as this disgrace needs to be reversed at some point in the future.