A black Emory University School of Law professor who teaches the hateful ideology known as critical race theory triggered outrage by decreeing that late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia “was basically a Klansman.”
Professor Darren Hutchinson made this claim Monday on social media based on Scalia’s opinion in the 1987 case McCleskey v. Kemp.
“Justice Scalia was basically a Klansman. I am teaching McCleskey in my CRT seminar on Wednesday. His memo to the justices in this case is so awful; in a just world, it would have led to his impeachment,” Hutchinson wrote in a Facebook post whose screenshot he later ported to Twitter.
“For those who are unfamiliar with the case, a black defendant produced a study showing a high degree of racism in use of the Georgia death penalty. The Court held that even if the statute showed racism generally, it could not prove discrimination in this single case. Scalia stated that even if the study proved discrimination, he would not vote to reverse the sentence,” he added.
Look (the tweet was made private early Wednesday morning):
#scotus #scalia #racism #crt #deathpenalty
Difficult lesson in Wednesday’s class. pic.twitter.com/NeLkra4jM1— Professor Darren Hutchinson (@dissentingj) January 9, 2023
The stunning, pointed attack on a deceased Supreme Court Justice provoked a flurry of outrage.
Here’s a sample of that anger:
It is sad that you are a law professor, to make a outlandish statement of a man who definitely was not a member of the Kkk, you said you are deep into CRT , that is fiction. Sad day in law in America with such nonsense
— Robert Chaisson (@RobertChaisso13) January 11, 2023
Typical of a racial activist to attack and make spurious claims against a deceased person with encyclopedic wealth of writings, speaking engagements and thousands of hours of recorded court briefs & discussions over fifty years to the contrary of the racist, activist accusations.
— WMEdelmann (@WMEdelmann) January 11, 2023
Try realizing that just because someone disagrees with you or looks different doesn’t make them a racist or any other degrading description. There’s racism in every culture and YOU choose to be a racist or not. MLK’s words ring “Not by the color but by the content of character.”
— Allan Smith (@RASmith0527) January 11, 2023
It is hard to watch Emory descend into mediocrity by hiring race hustlers as profs. Its been fashionable to hire racists to be racists in our colleges and universities but it is a fading fad. He will eventually fail on an island unto himself where he belongs.
— StockGlocks Rock (@stockglocksrock) January 11, 2023
I hope this racist gets sued by the Scalia family for defamation. Through the eyes of a racist, this professor seeks social justice and everything is racism to him obviously. He better have some proof that Scalia was in the KKK. This guy is everything Martin Luther King was not.
— Kim Lawson KY (@str8blues) January 11, 2023
Hutchinson’s summary of the case was correct, except that he neglected to mention a few pertinent facts.
One, the black defendant at the center of the case, Warren McCleskey, had killed a police officer while robbing a Georgia furniture store. Perhaps this is the reason why Scalia had been so hesitant about reversing his sentence, never mind his race.
Two, according to legal scholar Jonathan Turley, the majority opinion in the case was joined by four other justices: Lewis F. Powell Jr., William Rehnquist, Byron White, and Sandra Day O’Connor. In fact, it was written by Powell.
And so going by Hutchinson’s logic, Turley writes, the four other justices “are also presumably Klansmen.” So are the lower court judges who agreed with them.
“The issue on appeal was whether a general finding of racism in the system was sufficient or whether a defendant must show evidence of racism in his actual case. Both felony murder and the killing of an officer are commonly used as aggravating circumstances in capital cases,” Turley notes.
“The United States for the Eleventh Circuit rejected this use of a statistical study without evidence that racism played a role in the specific case under review. The court actually assumed the accuracy of the report for the purposes of the appeal but found that statistics are ‘insufficient to demonstrate discriminatory intent or unconstitutional discrimination in the Fourteenth Amendment context, [and] insufficient to show irrationality, arbitrariness and capriciousness under any kind of Eighth Amendment analysis.'”
The sad fact is that this type of ad hominem attack thrills many in academia while others are reluctant to speak out. Professor Hutchinson recounted how he taught a difficult lesson at Emory Law School on how “Justice Scalia was basically a Klansman.” …https://t.co/lBPXS81Nyi
— Jonathan Turley (@JonathanTurley) January 11, 2023
…If the professor views anyone supporting the decision ito be an effective klansman, it is hard to see how students in his class would feel comfortable in voicing such a view. Indeed, such positions may explain why 60 percent of students fear sharing their views in classes.
— Jonathan Turley (@JonathanTurley) January 11, 2023
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V. Saxena is a staff writer with a decade of experience as a professional writer, and a lifetime of experience as an avid news junkie. He holds a degree in computer technology from Purdue University. Saxena also contributes to BizPac Review.
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