This just-concluded Supreme Court term was filled with decisions upholding the requirements of the Constitution regarding individual rights, human equality, and separation of powers.

But the Left has responded, yet again, by attacking and threatening the justices. Two members of the "Squad," progressive Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and Ayanna Pressley (D-MA), are calling for the impeachment of justices and the packing of the court. Their tired assault on the judicial branch involves similarly worn-out critiques. Ocasio-Cortez, for example, said the court's opinions over the past few weeks "signal a dangerous creep towards authoritarianism and centralization of power in the court." Pressley declared that in addition to "legislating from the bench ... they continue to overturn the will of the majority of the people."

By what standards do they make these accusations?

Start with the claim that the court has centralized power to itself. How does that accusation square with Biden v. Nebraska, in which the Supreme Court voided the president's student loan cancellation plan? The case focused on whether the Biden administration had overstepped its executive power. This overstep involved going beyond the bounds set for the president by Congress through law. Moreover, in defending its action, the Biden administration tried to rewrite the Congress’s law, essentially asserting legislative power for itself instead of the House and Senate.

One would think a member of Congress would be glad for the court to check a president trying to supplant his own role within our constitutional government.

Next, let us consider the idea that the court legislates from the bench. To legislate from the bench means to write laws rather than faithfully interpret and apply them as written and intended by the law’s original ratifiers. Perhaps Pressley means the 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis outcome, in which a photographer wished not to have to create wedding websites for marriages to which she objected.

But there, the majority merely applied the words of the First Amendment to the case. The First Amendment declares that government may not infringe a person’s freedom of speech. This freedom, of course, means the government cannot punish speech merely because it does not like it or agree with it. However, the freedom of speech always has meant the government can’t force persons to speak ideas with which they do not agree, either. In this case, all parties to the case agreed the state of Colorado tried to make the photographer communicate and to communicate a message with which she deeply objected. The court’s majority saw clearly what a significant infringement of a constitutional right this requirement entailed. To decide otherwise would be the real legislating from the bench, a wrong made more pernicious because it would rewrite our constitution itself, not just a regular statute.

Or, finally, take the claim that the court thwarted majority will. Do they mean the court's opinion striking down affirmative action at Harvard University and the University of North Carolina? By what measure do they determine what is majority will? Polling consistently shows the public opposing race-based college admission policies by 20-point margins. Perhaps in their districts, the numbers are different. But their districts don’t mirror the country at large. Instead, they sit in deep-blue portions of the country where views are far out of the mainstream. The progressive opinion certainly skews the other way. But calling it the majority doesn’t make it so. And so saying cannot be contorted to be an appeal to the rule of the people. It really is an elitist argument, one that is saying the only opinion that matters is that which agrees with the Left’s own, partisan agenda.

We should reject these wild claims for what they are: cheap shots and shallow talking points. Instead, we should defend the court against these attacks. The last two terms have been among the best in a long time. They have so been because they have been among the most faithful to the judiciary’s role and to the Constitution in generations.

Adam Carrington is an assistant professor of politics at Hillsdale College.