WASHINGTON, D.C., July 19, 2012, (LifeSiteNews.com) – Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia defended his faith in the Constitution and the Catholic Church in an interview with CNN’s Piers Morgan last night.
Scalia faced probing questions about how a pro-life Catholic could adhere to the U.S. Constitution during a prerecorded interview on Piers Morgan Tonight. The justice stated a woman’s inviolable right to have abortion “is simply not in the Constitution.”
The British-born Morgan pursued the strict constructionist justice about abortion over the course of a series of questions.
Morgan asked Scalia why he was “so violently opposed” to Roe v. Wade.
“I wouldn’t say violently,” the justice said placidly. “I’m a peaceful man. You mean adamantly opposed.”
Scalia said the case was badly decided, because “the Constitution says nothing about” abortion.
“My view is that regardless of whether you think prohibiting abortion is good or whether you think prohibiting abortion is bad – regardless of how you come out on that – my only point is the Constitution does not say anything about it,” Scalia stated. “It leaves it up to democratic choice. Some states prohibited it and some states didn’t. What Roe v. Wade said was that no state can prohibit it.”
(Click “like” if you want to end abortion!
He added the theory of substantive due process, which influenced the opinion, is “simply a lie.”
Piers Morgan went on to question whether Scalia’s faith improperly influenced his interpretation of the U.S. Constitution.
“Clearly, as a conservative Catholic, you’re going to be fundamentally against abortion,” he noted. “How do you, as a conservative Catholic, how do you not bring your personal sense of what is right and wrong to that kind of decision?”
“Regardless of what my views as a Catholic are, the Constitution says nothing about it,” Scalia replied.
Scalia said he believes, “The Constitution, in fact ,says nothing at all about the subject.”
“Just as the pro-choice people say the Constitution prohibits the banning of abortion, so also the pro-life people say…that the Constitution requires the banning of abortion, because you’re depriving someone of life without due process of law,” he said. “I reject that argument just as I reject the other one. It is left to democratic choice.”
Scalia similarly rejected Morgan’s assertion that, when writing the Constitution, the Founding Fathers “gave women no rights.”
“Oh come on, no rights?” Scalia said, adding women had equal rights to due process under law, a significant step forward on the world stage.
Morgan argued the question of “a woman’s right to keep a baby or have an abortion” would have “never entered their minds.” Scalia, asking leading questions as though Morgan were a lawyer before his bench, replied, “They didn’t have wives and daughters that they cared about?”
Only “in the last century” did women begin to take charge “of their lives and rights,” Morgan stated. “Everybody believed that was the right thing to do, didn’t they? I mean, why would you seem to be against that?”
The justice appeared on the show to discuss his new book Reading Law: The Interpretation of Legal Texts co-authored with Bryan Garner.