Thinking about a nondecision that never came down via the so-called shadow docket in the middle of the night that allowed the second-largest state in the country to overturn a 50-year-old precedent without the Supreme Court writing a word is a bit like dancing between the raindrops. By doing nothing at all on Wednesday night, the Supreme Court largely evaded top-of-the-fold coverage or glaring headlines even as—for all intents and purposes—abortions after six weeks simply stopped in Texas at midnight (and not coincidentally on the day Texas Republicans passed their effort to further minority rule at the ballot box).
It’s easy to be angry at Journalism for failing to prioritize the story. Or at Democrats who control the House, the Senate and the White House for failing to do anything to protect women’s right to choose in Texas. But the problem with covering a thing that didn’t ever exactly happen is that Journalism is largely terrible at it, and the problem with being mad at Democrats is that quite literally the only thing that can be done about a stolen federal judiciary is to reform it. So far, Democrats are a combination of unable or unwilling when it comes to actually reforming the courts. (But don’t worry—there’s a Commission!) Supreme Court conservatives who know this have thus become terrifyingly adept at judging between the raindrops—at deciding life-and-death matters by way of unreasoned orders in the dead of night, based almost entirely on their feelings. They have fully mastered the game of denial and deflection, dressed up as humility and institutionalism.
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