Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s stop in Waco on Thursday evening will offer a glimpse into a justice system that affects all Americans.
Kavanaugh will appear at a sold-out free event at McLennan Community College as part of the Ken Starr Lecture Series. A crowd of about 2,500 is expected, making it one of the biggest events in MCC history.
The lecture series is named after former Baylor University president Ken Starr and brings national and world-renowned speakers to MCC.
The Supreme Court navigates the lines between the national and state government and how it interplays within the Constitution. Attendees will be able to hear firsthand from Kavanaugh about the importance of the judicial branch.
“Every once in a while, there are these generational cases where politics and culture and law all seem to come together at the Supreme Court,” said Ashley Cruseturner, MCC division chair and professor of history, who is speaking at the event.
In 1954, the Supreme Court in Brown v. Board of Education ruled that segregated schools were unconstitutional. A decade ago, the Supreme Court decision Obergefell v. Hodges legalized same-sex marriage throughout the United States.
Both cases had wide-ranging cultural and historical impact.
During the event, Cruseturner plans to talk about the perception of partisanship imposed on the court.
“The justices, they will not accept the idea that there’s a partisan difference,” Cruseturner said. “They won’t talk about it that way. They always say they wear black robes, not blue and red robes. They’re trying to judge the law on the merits of the law, but we sometimes want to impose political differences on them. So I might ask, ‘What’s it like within that?’”
The event will be the second time MCC has hosted a sitting Supreme Court justice. MCC previously hosted Justice Clarence Thomas in 2017. It is uncommon for large universities in Texas to get Supreme Court justices and less so for community colleges.
“They’re coming because of the relationship they had with Judge Ken Starr and Alice Starr,” Cruseturner said. “And so these two people who came to our community and adopted this community and stayed even after their service with Baylor was over, they were committed to Waco.”
Ken Starr, the Whitewater prosecutor, judge and Baylor president died in 2022. His wife, Alice Starr, has continued to be a supporter of MCC and other Waco causes.
Despite a nomination clouded by controversy, some court watchers felt Kavanaugh would be a fair justice. He previously worked as associate counsel and senior associate counsel in the White House Counsel’s Office under George W. Bush. He spent more than a decade on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.
In the last term, Kavanaugh sided with the majority of the court 92% of the time.
“He had a reputation as a very thoughtful purist and taking an approach that considered all sides, sort of at the center,” Cruseturner said.
“The expectation that he would be thoughtful and deliberate, I think it’s probably turned out to be true.”
MCC recommends that ticketholders arrive early to find parking and go through security. Doors open at 6 p.m. at the Highlands Gym, and the event begins at 7 p.m.
Disclosure: The family of Ken and Alice Starr has been a donor to the Waco Bridge.
