Let’s dispatch with the idea that the presumption of innocence applies only to court proceedings, in which your liberty is at stake. It doesn’t.
Thus far, he’s been judged rather harshly, with many willing to forgo due process and the presumption of innocence in favor of social media mob rule and activist juries. This may be the tipping point of the #MeToo moment that some of its supporters — including me — were afraid of.
As I’ve said all along, the allegations against Kavanaugh are serious and should be investigated to their conclusions. But the left’s sudden aversion to a long-standing pillar of democracy is culturally corrosive and could jeopardize the credibility of #MeToo for a long time to come.
Over the past week or so, I’ve both participated in and watched countless cable news panels where someone opposing Kavanaugh’s Supreme Court confirmation says straight-faced and earnestly that Kavanaugh simply does not “deserve” the presumption of innocence.
These arguments are politically convenient, but also fallacious.
And let’s dispatch with the idea that the presumption of innocence applies only to court proceedings, in which your liberty itself is at stake. It doesn’t.
There’s a reason why, when people are accused of crimes, the news media refer to the claims as “alleged.” It’s because in a civil society, we’ve had a longstanding norm that one person pointing the finger isn’t enough to smear another person with a deleterious label for the rest of his or her life.
The presumption of guilt has, of course, led to some considerably dark times in this country, including the persecution of Jews, the Irish, Italians and other ethnic minorities at one time or another, and not just in courts of law but “courts of credibility.”
See, too, McCarthyism, black lists and Japanese internment camps.
The pervasive and historic presumption of guilt by law enforcement of African-Americans, in particular black youths, has endangered, incarcerated and disadvantaged generations of American families for centuries.
The about-face is unfortunate. #MeToo progress is important and long overdue. But if it comes at the expense of basic human rights, long-held legal principles and democratic ideals we all used to agree on, it will not last very long.
