We’ve grown accustomed to institutions firing people when the social media outrage machine demands it. So, when George Washington University refused to dump Justice Clarence Thomas over abortion, it gave our republic reason to hope. 

After Justice Thomas joined the majority to overturn Roe v. Wade, some students demanded an end to his class on constitutional law, but GWU stood up to this intolerance.

The decision stands in stark contrast to others in higher education such as the recent one by Cornell University to remove a bust of President Lincoln and a plaque of the Gettysburg Address from its library.

“Someone complained, and it was gone,” a Cornell professor told the College Fix, demonstrating that even one of our greatest presidents and greatest speeches of all time is not safe from the so-called cancel culture.

GWU bucked this trend, saying of Justice Thomas, “Debate is an essential part of our university’s academic and educational mission.” It’s also a component vital to a free society.

“Just as we affirm our commitment to academic freedom,” GWU continued, “we affirm the right of all members of our communities to voice their opinions.”

Strictly speaking, Justice Thomas wasn’t voicing his opinion in the Roe ruling, but rather applying the law as he sees it, which is what distinguishes mob rule from the rule of law.

To do their jobs, judges must be willing to rule based on the law as passed by the legislature, not on political whims or personal feelings. 

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a liberal icon, criticized the 1973 Roe decision throughout her career — not because she supported unborn life, but on legal grounds. 

Ginsburg, the Washington Post wrote in May, observed that Roe would have been on more solid legal footing if rooted in the Constitution’s Equal Protection Clause, rather than the ephemeral “right to privacy.” 

She also argued that a wiser judicial course would have been “a more incremental approach to legalizing abortion, rather than the nationwide ruling in Roe that invalidated dozens of state antiabortion laws.”

These insights were similar to those of her friend and ideological opposite, Justice Antonin Scalia, who remarked that while the Burger Court had put up “the edifice of abortion … seemingly overnight” it would have to be torn down in stages, “door jamb by door jamb.”

Ginsburg, by the way, taught at my alma mater, Rutgers University. Did all the students agree with her rulings? Of course not, but it was a great opportunity to learn and remains an honor for the school. 

After all, there have only been 116 men and women on America’s highest court; having one of them teach you the law enriches your education, as GWU has affirmed. 

I have had the honor to spend time with Justice Thomas, and he’s the exact sort of person I wish had taught my classes. He’s a great conversationalist, which is why he enjoys traveling the country in his RV, speaking to citizens, and tailgating at football games of his beloved Nebraska Cornhuskers.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor, of the court’s liberal wing, had praise for this common touch, noting, “Justice Thomas is the one justice in the building that literally knows every employee’s name….

“And not only does he know their names, he remembers their families, names, and histories. He’s the first one who will go up to someone and inquire, ‘Is your son okay? How’s your daughter doing in college?’”

Justice Sotomayor added that while she “probably disagreed with him more than with any other justice,” he was the first person to send flowers when her stepfather died, because our common humanity must supersede disagreements if our republic is to endure.

GWU would have earned scorn from the outrage machine if it had caved. It deserves at least as much praise for keeping Justice Thomas at the front of a classroom.