How Judges Manipulate Law |
How Judges Manipulate Law
Today, many judges now view their role not as discovering what the law actually means but as rationalizing what they believe the law should mean.
Jim Cardoza | June 17, 2026
Americans are taught that justice is blind. We are told that judges simply apply the law as written, faithfully interpreting statutes and constitutional provisions without regard to politics, ideology, or personal preference. The image is comforting: a neutral arbiter weighing facts and law, untouched by partisan passions.
Yet anyone who has followed the modern judiciary for more than a few years recognizes a troubling reality. In most of the nation’s politically significant cases, the outcome can often be predicted less by the unambiguous language of the law than by the identity of the judge hearing the case. Before the first brief is filed and before oral arguments begin, seasoned observers frequently ask a simple question: “Who appointed the judge?”
The reason is obvious. In case after case involving elections, executive power, immigration, environmental regulation, gun rights, religious liberty, campaign finance, affirmative action, abortion, or administrative authority, judicial decisions frequently align with the political philosophies of the presidents who placed those judges on the bench.
This was not the Founder’s intention. The Constitution was to be law, not clay.
Words were chosen carefully. Powers were enumerated deliberately. Rights were specified explicitly. The purpose was to establish boundaries that the government could not cross regardless of who happened to hold office.
But a strange transformation has occurred over the last century. Today, many judges now view their role not as discovering what the law actually means but as rationalizing what they believe the law should mean.
The Founders envisioned something very different.
Alexander Hamilton described the judiciary as the “least dangerous branch” because it possessed........