In 1987, the Senate resoundingly rejected the nomination of Judge Robert Bork for the Supreme Court because it found his originalist views unacceptable. As a law professor, Bork argued that the meaning of a constitutional provision is fixed when it is adopted and can be changed only by amendment.
Under this view, there would be no constitutional protection for abortion or other privacy rights, no protection for women or gays and lesbians from discrimination, and no right to freedom of speech except for political expression. Bork, who was impeccably qualified, was defeated by the largest margin of any Supreme Court nominee in history.
Senators from both parties voted against Bork because his originalist philosophy was seen as nonsensical and dangerous. It makes no sense to limit the Constitution’s broad language to what was intended in the agrarian, slave society of 1787. Originalism was rightly regarded as a radical approach to constitutional law that would upend decades of precedents in a myriad of areas.
