Notable & Quotable: Silverglate on Kavanaugh ‘So much of the case being made against Kavanaugh is cynical, if not outright dishonest.’
https://www.wsj.com/articles/notable-quotable-silverglate-on-kavanaugh-1538170255
From “Kavanaugh: A Legal Assessment—With Some Personal Reflections” by Harvey Silverglate,
When does “adolescence” occur? I’ve represented a lot of kids in trouble. And I can tell you that in the modern era, adolescence begins around age 12 and lasts through college graduation (or, for kids who don’t attend college, the age at which kids would graduate).
This is not just my opinion: Society has juvenile courts for transgressions committed in adolescence; the legal system does not want to give mere kids a permanent criminal record. Even at a time when too many juveniles are treated as adults, it is more often than not a widely accepted guiding principle that kids are given a pass by being treated and taught more than punished.
Among many of my friends in Cambridge and Boston, my view of [Brett] Kavanaugh is considered wrongheaded—if not reckless, even dangerous. So, I’ll make matters worse by saying that so much of the case being made against Kavanaugh is cynical, if not outright dishonest. It has nothing to do with his qualifications to be a Supreme Court justice. Nor is it reflective of how Kavanaugh’s most ardent critics really feel about the extent to which adults should be punished later in life for their adolescent transgressions. They would not want their own children, nor themselves for that matter, treated in the way they are campaigning for Kavanaugh to be treated. This is a classic example of the hypocrisy of the current socio-political moment.
Comments are closed.
