The Reverend Franklin Graham's  exhortation to Christians regarding their presidential vote was based upon the U.S. Supreme Court vacancy. The media  reports:

Franklin Graham did not advocate for either Democrat Hillary Clinton or Republican Donald Trump, but he exhorted those in attendance to research the two parties’ platforms to determine which candidate would nominate Supreme Court justices who would defend religious values. The difference between the parties, he said, was “night and day.”

Reverend Graham and the presidential candidates and their supporters as well as too many other Americans seem to have forgotten the Constitutional role of a member of the U.S. Supreme Court. The oath which members take clearly states:

Instead of acknowledging members of the court are constitutionally required to be impartial, politicians, candidates, citizens and the media view the vacancy on the court as a political position. The discussion about the vacancy is focused on appointing "their" kind of judge and they mean a judge whose religious and political views are in agreement with their own. This is exactly what is done when we vote for the executive and legislative members, but is in total conflict with the constitutional provisions applying to the court which require someone totally impartial and without any agenda. 

 

Remember your high school civics class lessons about the constitution dividing the federal government into three branches: executive, legislative and judicial? Each branch was given constitutional power to maintain checks on  the other two  branches in order to have a balanced republic and not a dictatorship. The Constitution made the U.S. Supreme Court the highest court in the nation. Article III of the constitution says its decisions are the the supreme law of the land. It required fair minded, objective and impartial judges whose sole role was to decide the legality of the of the actions of the other two branches. It deliberately did not give the court any legislative powers. It's not supposed to have a political or religious agenda. Members were not to be selected for their religious or political views. The founders wanted  just the opposite in members of the court. 

 

We seem to have forgotten  that the founders of  the country wanted a balanced government of checks and balances.  That is why they created the three separate, independent branches and divided their functions into legislative: passing laws, executive: presidential functions and judicial: deciding the constitutionality and legality of the laws and actions of the other two branches. This system of checks and balances was designed to ensure that no one branch held too much power or authority. This separation of  powers was intended to  prevent one part of government to be in total control or have too  much power or authority  over the other branch. If members of the court are selected on the basis of whether their political and religious views are consistent with views of the other two branches or the electors, there is no balance of power. There is instead a dictatorship of too much power without checks and balances

 

This is shown by the founders imposing a duty to run for office and be elected to a position involving the legislative and executive branches. But, to ensure absolute independence of judicial decisions, U.S. Supreme Court judges  were appointed for  life and did not run for office. To provide balance of power over selections, the Constitution gave the president power to nominate members of the court and the senate the power to confirm their appointment  or not. 

 

The two candidates for the  presidency and too many other people want to approach the appointment of a Supreme Court justice as purely a political and religious selection which is in total conflict with our constitution. If our vote for president is determined  by seeing the court as just another political body and wanting  our religious views or our political conservative vs liberal views made the law, we eliminate the balance  of  power which makes us a republic. Voting that way contributes to the breakdown of  checks and balances as well as  the important constitutional separation of powers of government. Do we really want a government that  enforces  laws everyone must follow because they are our religious or political views we want to require  everyone  to follow? Isn't that what the terrorists of the Islamic radicals want?