No ‘dogma': Democrats walk tightrope on Barrett’s faith

WASHINGTON — “The dogma lives loudly within you.” It’s that utterance from California Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, that’s on the minds of Democrats and Republicans preparing for this coming week’s hearings with Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., says any attacks on Barrett’s faith are a “disgrace.” Democrats, he said, are “so disconnected from their own country that they treat religious Americans like strange animals in a menagerie.” Democratic leaders have pledged to focus their questioning elsewhere — particularly on the Affordable Care Act, which is being challenged before the court next month, and Barrett’s stance on the landmark Roe v. Wade abortion ruling. A Republican on the committee, Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri, asked Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York to ensure Democrats don’t give oxygen to what Hawley said is a “a long history of anti-Catholic hatred by some in this country.” Several Democrats on the committee said this past week that asking about religion would be inappropriate, yet avoiding faith completely could constrain their ability to sharply question Barrett on issues that she herself explored in rulings and legal writings. In 1998, Barrett co-wrote a law review article that said Catholic judges must “adhere to their church’s teaching on moral matters,” suggesting they might have to recuse themselves in certain death penalty cases. Barrett’s declaration that it is “never” appropriate for judges to apply their personal convictions came in response to the committee’s then-chairman, Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa, who said she had been “outspoken about your role and your Catholic faith.” He asked her about the propriety of a judge putting “their religious views above applying the law.” Both Grassley and Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, asked Barrett about the 1998 article on faith and the death penalty.