My understanding is though that it’s more about the imperative to assert Jewish values, and they do not think it has any real effect on the court’s decision.
https://traditiononline.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Symposium.pdfBut there are also many issues in which our community’s tangible interests are at best negligible or indirect, and where the importance of our active involvement may be less readily apparent. These include several controversial social and moral issues where, as in the case of abortion, the liberal or libertarian position may not coincide with Torah values but in no way inhibits our ability to lead Torah-true lifestyles; and where, again as in the case of abortion, any contribution we may make
to the broad national debate is unlikely to turn the tide in any event. To what extent, if at all, should we inject ourselves into the national dialogue over such issues?
From Agudath Israel’s perspective, at least, the answer may well depend on the extent to which our co-religionists enter the public fray, purporting to speak under the banner of Judaism while in fact misrepre- senting our religious faith. When they do, then our responsibility to speak out extends beyond whatever role we may have to serve as an or la-goyy- im, a light unto the nations, and requires us affirmatively to dispel the darkness unfortunately created by our own wayward Jewish brethren. Hence the need to speak out on abortion.
Or, to take another prominent example, when non-Orthodox groups file amicus curiae briefs urging civil recognition of same-sex “marriages,” and when Reform Jewish leaders adduce support for such unions in explicitly religious terms by sophistic citation of biblical sources showing that all human beings are created in the Divine image, it becomes incumbent on the Orthodox community to point out that Leviticus is part of the Jewish Bible too. The joint amicus curiae brief recently filed by Agudath Israel and the Orthodox Union defending the traditional definition of marriage in the Supreme Court of Massachusetts is one way of discharging that responsibility.
In getting involved in these issues, our goal is not so much to influ- ence the outcome of the debate as it is simply to speak the truth. Our target audience is not so much the policy decision-makers themselves, as it is the broad public whose understanding of Judaism would other- wise be shaped by the falsifiers of our faith. What needs to be protected is not so much the rights of the unborn or the traditional definition of marriage, as it is the integrity of Torah and the honor of Heaven. From this perspective, it is more important that our amicus curiae presenta- tion in a case like Webster be cited by The New York Times than by the Supreme Court itself, that our congressional testimony in support of the Defense of Marriage Act be televised on C-Span than capture the attention of the bored-looking Senators conducting the hearing.