Rubio would trash Equal Protection Clause

Just as I begin to like a Republican presidential candidate, in this case, Marco Rubio, he finds a way to let me down. I simply do not respect any politician who thinks that constitutional equal protection of the law is not a fundamental right enjoyed by all. That is exactly what Rubio thinks and he has promised if elected president to appoint Supreme Court Justices who think so too.

In this day and age, who seriously believes that the constitution allows white people to pass laws mandating segregation of the races in public schools? What politician in his right mind today would promise to bring racial segregation and Jim Crow laws back? Yet that is precisely what social conservatives like Marco Rubio once believed. That was during the dark ages of U.S. history before the civil rights movement.

It appears that Mr. Rubio, and many, if not most, of the other GOP social conservatives, have failed to learn the American history lesson that constitutional equal protection of the law is supposed to protect us all. They’ve not given up in their bigoted crusade to deny equal marriage rights to gays. Marco Rubio in particular doesn’t think that battle is quite over just yet despite the fact that an overwhelming majority of Americans would disagree.

"It is the current law. I don't believe any case law is settled law," says Rubio "Any future Supreme Court can change it…  And ultimately, I will appoint Supreme Court justices that will interpret the Constitution as originally constructed,"

In short, Marco Rubio promises to appoint SCTOUS justices who will deny equal protection of the law to gays. It’s the same as promising to appoint justices who would validate racial segregation and Jim Crow laws under the Constitution. After all, that’s how the Constitution was once interpreted.

"I don't think the current Constitution gives the federal government the power to regulate marriage," Rubio declared. "What is wrong is that the Supreme Court has found this hidden constitutional right that 200 years of jurisprudence had not discovered and basically overturned the will of the voters in Florida, where over 60 percent passed a constitutional amendment that defined marriage in the state constitution as the union of one man and one woman."

That “hidden constitutional right” is the Fourteenth Amendment Equal Protection Clause, the same constitutional provision which SCOTUS applied in Brown v Board of Education to put an end to racial discrimination in the public schools. The federal government isn’t regulating marriage. It is simply applying the Fourteenth Amendment constitutional rights to gays. When did Florida voters acquire the power to deny that constitutional right to a minority by vote?

Marco Rubio, like so many other GOP social conservative candidates, has his head in the sand. In his foolish effort to pander to the ultra-right wing evangelical wing of his party before the Iowa caucuses, by trashing the Equal Protection Clause, he’s willing to damage the chances of the ultimate GOP nominee to prevail in the general election.

I’ve said it many times before and it needs saying again: This is the kind of religiously oriented political nonsense that scares the daylights out of the average American voter. This is why the GOP will have a hard time beating Hilary Clinton – a proven criminal and incompetent -- in the general election.

One doesn’t easily get elected President of the United States of America by trashing the Equal Protection clause.