February 1, 2017 8:03AM

Neil Gorsuch Will Make a Fine Justice

By Ilya Shapiro

My first choice from the president’s fabulous list of terrific judges — they’re all winners, believe me (no really, solid list) — was probably the judiciary’s twitter laureate, Texas Supreme Court Justice Don Willett, but Judge Neil Gorsuch of the Tenth Circuit was right up there. As you can see by my statement to CNN, I’m pleased as punch with the selection. 


There’ll be time enough to analyze Judge Gorsuch’s work, but after reading a stack of his opinions over the weekend, the most salient parts of his judicial record are as follows:

  1. A keen appreciation for constitutional structure as a guarantor of our rights and liberties.
  2. A real devotion to originalism — probably more than the self‐​described “faint‐​hearted originalist” Antonin Scalia — and textualism.
  3. Strong support for the freedom of speech and religion, and the First Amendment more broadly.
  4. Skepticism of the administrative state.
  5. Like Scalia, he construes criminal statutes narrowly, so people aren’t convicted and punished without the government’s meeting its evidentiary burden or establishing that it didn’t violate constitutional rights in arresting and prosecuting defendants.
  6. Really, really good writing, which even Justice Elena Kagan has praised.

Gorsuch also maintains a good relationship with Cato and has published a Policy Analysis with us. In short, Donald Trump has managed to pick a nominee who should please everyone other than progressives: social conservatives, libertarians, legal elites, and I imagine the populists who trust him to pick “the best judges.” Left‐​wing activists are already talking about how Gorsuch is extreme and is anti‐​women, workers, yada yada — they have to raise money somehow — but I find it hard to see how Senate Democrats will muster 40 votes to sustain a filibuster against someone who was unanimously confirmed in 2006, particularly with a tough 2018 map.


For more analysis, see my short piece in the New York Post, plus Andrew Grossman and David Rivkin in the Wall Street Journal, as well as these excellent essays by Ramesh Ponnuru and Ed Whelan.