Cass R. Sunstein, Columnist

Originalists Put Politics Over Principle

The Republican litmus test for a court nominee has little to do with reverence for the Constitution.

January 30, 2017 at 7:16 PM UTC

Cass R. Sunstein is a former Bloomberg Opinion columnist. He is the author of “The Cost-Benefit Revolution” and a co-author of “Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth and Happiness.”

Open to interpretation.
Photographer: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

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President Donald Trump’s Supreme Court nominee, to be announced on Tuesday, is likely to be some kind of “originalist.” For many conservatives, that’s terrific news.

Improbably, originalism has become a litmus test, a simple way of distinguishing judges from politicians, using the Constitution to impose their values on the rest of us. But what is originalism?