Kagan's Hero: 'Most Liberal Activist Judge' In The World

President Obama's nominee for the Supreme Court, Elena Kagan, once called a judge universally regarded as one of the most extreme liberal activist high court justices in history "my judicial hero."

"He is the judge who has best advanced democracy, human rights, the rule of law and justice," stated Kagan in September 2006 introductory remarks at a Harvard University award ceremony.

Kagan was referring to Aharon Barak, the retired president of the Supreme Court of Israel, who at the time was receiving the Peter Gruber Foundation 2006 Justice Prize at Harvard.

Barak has been recognized across the political spectrum as one of the most liberal activist judges.

Richard Goldstone, a left-leaning South African judge who infamously penned a United Nations report accusing Israel of war crimes, termed Barak "unashamedly what, in U.S. terms, would be regarded as an 'activist judge.'"

Jerusalem Post columnist Caroline Glick commented that under Barak's judicial leadership "the country was effectively transformed from a parliamentary democracy governed by law into a judicial tyranny governed by the preferences and prejudices of a fraternity of lawyers that Barak empowered."

"Barak has presided over the Court for eleven years. As a self-declared 'judicial-statesman,' he used his position on the bench to reshape Israeli society and politics in his own image through his "constitutional revolution," Glick wrote.

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