Quote Originally Posted by smokelaw1 View Post
Oh, judicial activism...which comes first, believing in a "living document" constitution or being a"liberal?" Being a strict textualist/original intent guy or a "conservative?"

The Warren court, from Brown v. BoE to the Griswold line of cases, led the way to Roe with an alternative (to strict textualism) way of seeing the document that gives us our rights.

Now, if being a living document academic makes me a whacked out activist, then I agree with you 100%.
I just don't belive it does, any more than being an original intent scholar makes Bork, Scalia, and Roberts reactionary and backward thinking (I happen to believe they are wrong, though).
Obviously there is no perfect ideal of activism or strict constructionism, like everything else it requires practical judgment. But Roe v. Wade is generally believed to be the one of the most extreme and cynnical acts of blatant legislation by the court, even by it's supporters.