A Conversation with Robert P. George: 30 Years After “The End of Democracy”

The West's de-moralization—the detachment of politics from moral truth—has been worsening for decades, but we can learn from this long and continuing struggle.

Robert P. George is an eminent legal scholar, political philosopher, and public intellectual. He is the McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence at Princeton University, where he directs the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions. He has been at the pinnacle of Christian political thought throughout his career.

Why this conversation matters: In 1996, First Things, the distinguished journal on religion and public life, published a symposium entitled “The End of Democracy? The Judicial Usurpation of Politics.” Decrying “an entrenched pattern” of judicial overreach that evinced contempt for traditional morality, the forum boldly warned of an imminent danger to American self-government. In “The Tyrant State,” Professor George argued key court rulings violated democracy’s “moral linchpin…the substantive principle of equal worth and dignity.”

This interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.

THE CONVERSATION

RtW: Dr. George, what would you describe as the context and purpose of the symposium “The End of Democracy”? What justified the claim in 1996 of the judicial usurpation of politics, and the audacious question as to whether this could mean the end of American democracy?

George: In “The End of Democracy?”, my co-contributors and I argued that the judiciary’s usurpation of democratic legislative authority is, indeed, anti-democratic. In many cases over the decades prior to 1996, the courts had presumed to impose, by judicial fiat, final answers to properly political questions crucial to our life together. Roe v Wade was by no means the only example of that. Additionally, it appeared the Supreme Court might soon impose assisted suicide on the states in defiance of contrary legislative judgments. Government by an electorally unaccountable, black-robed oligarchy confounded our claim to be a self-governing people. Moreover, judicial rulings often flagrantly contravened justice and moral truth, the very premise of democracy. Left unchecked, this could mean democracy’s end.