Gowdy: Our rights should be debated at ballot boxes and in Congress, not by 'five lawyers in black robes'

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Trey Gowdy says he doubts leaked Supreme Court draft will reflect the finished decision

'Sunday Night in America' host responds to outrage over the leaked Supreme Court opinion draft.

"Sunday Night in America" host Trey Gowdy addressed the leaked Supreme Court draft opinion on his show over the weekend, arguing that the right to life should be debated at the ballot boxes and legislative bodies instead of voters relying on "five lawyers in black robes to…tell us what our rights are."

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TREY GOWDY: When it comes to the instant debate on abortion, I don’t know if the leaked draft opinion will reflect the finished product, I doubt it, but I don’t know it. What I do know, is the issue is not going away. If Roe V. Wade is overturned and the issue reversed to the states, some states will ban all abortions including in the case of rape, incest and when the life of the mother is in danger. Some states will expand access to abortions and allow it up to the moment of birth or maybe even beyond in the case of partial birth abortions. It may be fine for the 50 states to have different views on education, crime, or the legalization of drugs. When life begins is not an issue subject to 50 different opinions. 

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The right to life is not only mentioned in the Constitution, ‘No person shall be deprived of life,’ it is also mentioned on our birth certificate, The Declaration of Independence: ‘Endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights; and among these are also life…it’s right there in black and white in both of our foundational documents.

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Democracy is hard. It was intended to be hard. It’s a privilege earned with the lives and limbs of others. It’s easy to sit around and wait for five lawyers in black robes to look in the shadows of a penumbra and tell us what our rights are. That is judicial oligarchy. It’s harder to go into the public square and the ballot box and the floor of a legislative body and debate it. But that’s what we should do. Do it for ourselves. Not wait for unelected lawyers who live lives of virtual isolation to do it for us. Our rights do not belong in any shadow. Bring them into the light.

WATCH TREY GOWDY'S FULL OPENING MONOLOGUE HERE:

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