In a distressing new trend that all serious abortion-rights activists should condemn immediately, a pro-choice group is offering online payments to restaurant staff who spot conservative Supreme Court justices at Washington-area restaurants and tip off protesters so they can harass the justices. It’s difficult to overstate how counterproductive such tactics are to the legitimate cause of restoring women’s biological rights — a cause that can only lose mainstream support with radical and provocative stunts like this.
Fury at the Supreme Court majority that overturned Roe v. Wade last month is real, and justified. The new majority zealously eviscerated Roe at the first opportunity, putting their own ideological agenda above a woman’s equal right to control her body, above respect for settled law and above the opinion of a clear majority of Americans. They have undermined the right of self-determination and endangered the health and lives of countless women and girls in much of America. The high court richly deserves its deep and likely lasting loss of legitimacy across the nation.
But no one deserves to be hounded out of a restaurant by a mob, no matter how justified the cause might be. That’s what happened to Justice Brett Kavanaugh recently at Morton’s the Steakhouse, a toney District of Columbia restaurant. When the restaurant later issued a statement defending Kavanaugh’s right to eat there unharassed, protesters harassed the restaurant chain itself, with online trolling and a flood of fake reservations made under prank names.
