Obama Nominates ‘Activist’ Harold Koh to State Department

President Obama has nominated Harold Koh to be the State Department’s top legal advisor. According to the New York Post Koh believes “judges should interpret the Constitution according to other nations’ legal ‘norms.’ Sharia law could apply to disputes in US courts [and] the United States constitutes an ‘axis of disobedience’ along with North Korea and Saddam-era Iraq.”

Koh, a self-described “activist,” would plainly promote his views aggressively once at State. He’s not likely to feel limited by the letter of the law — in 1994, he told The New Republic: “I’d rather have [former Supreme Court Justice Harry] Blackmun, who uses the wrong reasoning in Roe [v. Wade] to get the right results, and let other people figure out the right reasoning.”

Worse, the State job might be a launching pad for a Supreme Court nomination. (He’s on many liberals’ short lists for the high court.) Since this job requires Senate confirmation, it’s certainly a useful trial run.

What happens to Koh in the Senate will send an important signal. If he sails through to State, he’s a far better bet to make it onto the Supreme Court. So Senate Republicans have a duty to expose and confront his radical views.

Even though he’s up for a State Department job, Koh is a key test case in the “judicial wars.” If he makes it through (which he will if he gets even a single GOP vote) the message to the Obama team will be: You can pick ‘em as radical as you like.

I shudder at the thought of Koh on the US Supreme Court. He could make Ruth Bader Ginsberg look like a center-right Justice. Not to mention the damage he can do at the State Department.

Obama nominated Koh on March 23 to become the State Department’s legal adviser — an appointment that, if confirmed by the Senate, will give Koh far-reaching influence over the extent to which international norms affect U.S. law. 

“This is not a desk job. This guy will be the face of American international law around the world,” said Steven Gross, legal expert and fellow at the conservative Heritage Foundation.

“The top legal adviser at State travels extensively and is involved in international legal negotiations, treaties and in major United Nations conferences. 

“The president should have the right to choose the most conservative or liberal legal advisers to give them advice, but this is much more than that. The concern is that he cares as much about — if not more about — international law and integrating that into the American judicial system than he does about protecting American prerogatives and American sovereignty,” Gross said.

Just what we need, another ‘activist’ on Team Obama. We can kiss American sovereignty goodbye because I can’t imagine any Republicans in the Senate doing anything to stop this nomination. Unless of course we find out he didn’t pay his illegal nanny’s payroll taxes.