Tea at Trianon: Kavanaugh Hands Republicans a New Path

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Wednesday, July 8, 2026

Kavanaugh Hands Republicans a New Path

From The Daily BS:

The Court ruled against Trump’s executive order that sought to limit automatic citizenship for children born in the United States to illegal immigrants and certain temporary visa holders. The majority concluded that the order could not stand, preserving the long-standing interpretation of the 14th Amendment’s Citizenship Clause.

That headline generated predictable celebration from immigration activists and predictable frustration from conservatives. Yet the more interesting story may be found in the concurring opinion written by Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

Kavanaugh agreed that Trump could not simply rewrite existing law through executive action. At the same time, he suggested Congress could potentially revisit the issue legislatively.

“Congress could — consistent with the Fourteenth Amendment — amend” existing citizenship statutes or “otherwise enact new legislation establishing exceptions to birthright citizenship for children born to foreign citizens unlawfully or temporarily in the country,” Kavanaugh wrote, according to reports summarizing the opinion.

That single paragraph immediately electrified Republicans who have long argued that modern immigration realities bear little resemblance to the circumstances lawmakers faced when the 14th Amendment was ratified in the aftermath of the Civil War. (Read more.)