A quality judgment by Trump

Donald Trump has achieved one of the most significant victories of his presidency, with the 52-48 approval by the US Senate and immediate swearing in of Amy Coney Barrett as a Supreme Court justice. It should give the Trump campaign a boost. Grassroots support for his pledge to change the progressive-liberal character of the powerful court was a key reason for his 2016 win, especially among evangelical groups and pro-life campaigners.

Justice Coney Barrett, 48, is widely admired as a highly qualified, constitutional conservative, someone Democrats regard as a potential threat on legal challenges to Obamacare, abortion law, same-sex marriage and environment law. But her decision-making as a judge is likely to be guided by the fact she is an originalist and a textualist. She interprets the constitution as it was written and legislation as it is written. At her swearing in she pledged to “do my job without any fear or favour … independently of both the political branches, and of my own preferences”.

Unless a Biden administration overturned 150 years of tradition and increased the court for political purposes, the 6-3 majority could keep it on a conservative course for years, regardless of who’s in the White House.

In two forthcoming appointments to Australia’s High Court, our nation would also be best served by judges who apply the law in a black-letter way, as legal conservatives, as distinct from political conservatives.