Don’t bend your principles to get a desired outcome
What was wrong with the ouster of justices in 2010 is just as wrong today
Justice David May (photo from the Iowa Supreme Court)
Here we go again.
Don’t be surprised if there is a hard-fought campaign between now and the November election over a guy named David May. You may not recognize his name. But you will in the weeks to come.
May is the newest member of the Iowa Supreme Court. His name will be on the ballot in November, with voters having the opportunity to weigh in on whether he should be retained as one of the seven justices on the court.
May is a native of Kirksville, Mo. He received a bachelor’s degree from the University of Missouri in Columbia and a master’s degree in public health from the University of Oklahoma before earning his law degree from Drake University in 1998.
May was in private legal practice in Des Moines until 2016, when Gov. Terry Branstad appointed him as a district court judge. Three years later, Gov. Kim Reynolds appointed him to the Iowa Court of Appeals. Two years ago, Reynolds chose him to fill a vacancy on the Supreme Court following Justice Brent Appel’s retirement.
But this is not why May likely will become a household name this autumn.
That will occur because he was among the four Supreme Court justices who decided in June that the state can enforce Iowa’s near-total abortion ban, which Republicans approved during a special legislative session in July 2023. Supporters of pregnant women’s right to choose whether to have an abortion have been talking up the idea of using the November retention referendum on May to convey their disagreement with the Supreme Court’s decision.
Borrowing the Vander Plaats playbook
My friend Rekha Basu, the retired Des Moines Register columnist, wrote recently about efforts by a group called Iowans for Reproductive Freedom. The organization has not taken an official position on Justice May, although it has purchased billboards around Des Moines bearing messages like “Keep Government Out of Women’s Health Care” and “If Men Got Pregnant, We Wouldn’t Be Discussing This.”
One of the group’s founders, Lea DeLong of Des Moines, wrote a letter that is circulating among like-minded people. In that letter, she writes, “It is an unfortunate development in our society that these kinds of actions against judges must happen, but I’m afraid we have had to learn some sad lessons from those who deny the rights of women.”
DeLong told Basu, “The ideological bias of this court does not reflect the will of most Iowans, and I’m not sure how far it follows the constitution.”
Iowans for Reproductive Freedom is taking a page right from the playbook of conservative activist Bob Vander Plaats and his organization, the Family Leader. He and others were angered by the Iowa Supreme Court’s unanimous 2009 decision finding the state discriminated against same-sex couples by limiting civil marriage to couples of opposite gender. Vander Plaats and others successfully campaigned against retaining three Supreme Court justices in the 2010 general election.
Iowans who thought retaliation was wrong then for one decision (among the hundreds that justices Marsha Ternus, David Baker and Michael Streit made) should not be rationalizing now why retribution against David May is somehow different and right.
Either your principles are carefully thought out and are firmly held, or your principles are as flexible as a foam pool noodle and you stand by them only when convenient.
Legislature is where change is made
Two Des Moines attorneys, Guy Cook and Cynthia Moser, both former presidents of the Iowa State Bar Association, are of the firmly-held-principles school of thought. They wrote in a recent guest column in the Des Moines Register, “Voting Justice May out will not, and cannot, change the opinion of the Iowa Supreme Court.”
They continued: “As children, we all learned the timeless proverb that two wrongs don’t make a right, a straightforward concept that sums up the enduring wisdom that responding to a perceived or real injustice with another act of injustice or wrongdoing is never justified or ethical.”
It is entirely proper to disagree with a judge’s ruling. Judges and attorneys often disagree over what a law means. Trying to oust an honorable member of the court because of such a disagreement moves us one step closer to judges making their decisions based public opinion, not on guiding legal doctrines.
Cook and Moser explained it this way: “Reasonable people can, and do, disagree on abortion restrictions and reproductive rights. Indeed, three Iowa Supreme Court justices, including the chief justice, did just that, with detailed and forceful dissenting opinions.
“… When citizens disagree with a court’s interpretation of a law, they can petition the Legislature to amend the law, or, if they disagree with a court’s interpretation of the Constitution, they have the power to seek to amend the Constitution.”
Perpetuating the cycle of retribution that Bob Vander Plaats launched 14 years ago will not change how Iowa law views abortion. It will only serve to further undermine judicial independence in our state.
Iowans should not want that, regardless of what side we are on with one issue or another.
“Stray Thoughts” is part of the Iowa Writers’ Collaborative, a variety of columns and opinion articles written by 50 Iowans and former Iowans. You will find links to their columns here:
Iowa Writers Collaborative: Roundup
What goes around comes around.
Well stated, Randy.
They go low, we go high.
But a sad commentary on today's politics.