Courts Liberalism and Rights: Gay Law and Politics in the United States and CanadaPhilosophy matters. In the courts the best hope for an expansion of rights comes from judges who view liberalism as grounded in an expansion of rights rather than the constraint of government activity. Courts, Liberalism, and Rights begins with the premise that the courts offer the best chance for achieving a broad set of rights for gays and lesbians, particularly those courts whose judges draw on the expansive interpretation of liberalism.