No Secret Handshakes

No Secret Handshakes.



As a former student chapter president of the Federalist Society, I feel it is my duty and obligation to point out a crucial reason that so many legal conservatives have been members of the Federalist Society: There is no where else to go! Beginning in law school, soon to be lawyers learn that there are many opportunities for the leftist or aspiring leftists to go. Nearly all the clubs hold a left wing ideological bent, the schools' prominently leftist faculty harangue students in the virtues of left wing legal reasoning (i.e., feminist critical legal theories, queer legal theories, etc), and the administrations are no less leftist in their religious devotion to "diversity" which of course excludes conservatives. With all this going on, there is no place for conservative law students to go.



Once one becomes a lawyer, the options don't get better. Most professional legal organizations act pretty much the same way. The Federalist Society is pretty much the only active conservative/libertarian intellectual (and non-partisan) legal group there is. If there was much more competition for conservtives' attention, there would not be such a common "Federalist Society chromosome" running throughout a conservative administration. That there is, however, is no knock on conservatives. We just like the Federalist Society. It does a good job in promoting its views and pretty much has a captive audience. That is why it is no surprise that John Roberts had at least a working knowledge and loose affiliation with the group. A bright conservative intellectual like him has no other place to go.



I know that liberals wish there was no Federalist Society, but in practice liberals pretty much wish there were no conservaties. so that response is nothing new. But without liberals, there would be no Federalist Society. The Society, like many conservative think tanks, was created in response to the orthodox left wing thought running rampant in the profession.



Roberts may be the first nominee to the court who could be loosely associated with the Federalist Society. Hopefully, he won't be the last.