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Matt Yglesias on yesterday’s court ruling that tossed out California’s ban on gay marriage:

Whenever a favorable-to-progressives judicial ruling come down, the concern trolls come out of the woodwork to fret about the backlash. So in the wake of a win for the left on Proposition 8 in California, I wanted to go on record alongside Ryan as thinking such concerns are, when genuine, wildly overblown.

The American political system has a lot of features that differentiate it from most modern liberal democracies. These features include an unusually large number of veto points and also a greatly empowered federal judiciary. I’m not a huge fan of either feature, but the system is what it is and the interplay between the two means that responsible political advocates will always want to use all the levers at their disposal — including litigation — in order to get their way. Once laws are on the books, overturning them is generally an extremely cumbersome process. Merely persuading most people that you’re right doesn’t do the trick. And the system doesn’t really function in a “majoritarian” way at any level so the non-majoritarian aspects of seeking policy objectives through the courts don’t differentiate them from anything else.

I agree. There’s no doubt that judicial decisions create backlashes, but the evidence is pretty thin that they create backlashes that are any worse than legislative or executive decisions. For better or worse, everyone involved in the American politics is now well aware that courts are an important part of the political process and they’re fair game to be exploited as effectively as possible. That’s just the way things are, and both sides play the game equally hard.

In this case, however, there’s a different concern: using the judicial system might be perfectly kosher, but was it wise? The answer is: only if you win. And there are pretty substantial doubts that yesterday’s victory will hold up all the way to the Supreme Court. Judge Walker’s mountainous finding of facts aside, do we really think the Supreme Court is ready to rule that every state in the union is required to allow same-sex marriage? Maybe! But the odds seem long, and if we lose the case it’s likely to be a decade or two before the court is willing to reconsider.

In the end, that might not be so bad. There’s still a chance of winning, and a loss only means that we go back to state-by-state battles, which is exactly where we are now. But it’s still a key question.

WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

payment methods

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