Category Archives: Courts

“Radical-Right” and the Left

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The Washington Post ran a panic-mongering op-ed about the Supreme Court last week.

Last month, the new conservative majority—being driven by Justices Neil M Gorsuch and Brett M Kavanaugh—signaled that this change is coming. In overruling a 40-year-old precedent governing how state governments can be sued, the new court majority, all of whom pledged reverence for precedent during their Senate confirmation hearings—sang a different song: “stare decisis is ‘not an inexorable command,’ … and is ‘at its weakest’ when interpreting the Constitution.” This was the second time in less than a year that the conservative majority has tossed aside decades-old precedent.

Thus screamed the WaPo in its terror.  Never mind that reverence for precedent is not blind adherence to it, no matter how wrong the precedent.  The Brown example the paper so piously cited elsewhere in its op-ed was itself an overturning of an 80-year-old precedent, that of Plessy.  Never mind, more importantly, that as Justice Clarence Thomas has said on many occasions, the primary precedent in all of American jurisprudence is the text of our Constitution.

And this “fear:”

….race-conscious programs in employment and admissions that are now pervasive could be forbidden.

The op-ed’s author wrote that with no trace of irony.

“Race-conscious” programs are by definition racist; that they’re pervasive just means that the evil is far too ubiquitous.  They should be forbidden, and the sooner and louder the better.

And this:

The past decade has seen a conservative court slow further social progress….

That’s entirely appropriate, it’s regrettable that this was even necessary, and it’s further regrettable that court-imposed “social progress” was only slowed and not halted altogether.  Social progress—whatever that is—is a political matter, to be furthered or opposed only by the political arms of our government.  Courts have no legitimate role in political matters; this is made clear in that primary precedent’s Article I, Section 1.

The paper headlined its op-ed thusly:

We need to prepare for a complete reversal of the role the Supreme Court plays in our lives

I certainly hope the Court reverses course; I certainly hope the Court goes back to applying the Constitution and the laws as they’re written, instead of in accordance with the “philosophies” of the likes of Thurgood Marshall—”I make my ruling and expect the law to catch up”—and Ruth Bader Ginsburg of living Constitution, amend it from the bench according to a judge’s personal view of society, ideology.  I certainly hope the Court reverses its role in our political lives and absents itself from it.

It’s illustrative of how dangerously far left the Left has gone when simple adherence to the Constitution is radical-right.

Appeals to Courts Vice Voters Vice….

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Wisconsin’s Progressive-Democrats failed at the polls, for all that they won the Governor’s and Attorney General’s chairs in 2018, so they tried to get the courts to impose their policies by judicial fiat.  That failed, too, so now what?  How can these Know Betters get their plans imposed on the unwashed citizenry?

It seems that the duly elected State legislature and duly elected State governor had passed a number of laws that limited the power of the Governor and the State Attorney General.  The fact that these laws were enacted after those 2018 elections and before the new Governor and Attorney General took office was somehow supposed to delegitimize those laws.  Or so the Progressive-Democrat Governor and AG insisted.  The people were still speaking, but they should not be listened to.

Therefore, these Progressive-Democrats went into court to get the people’s will, as expressed through their elected representatives, tossed out.  The people’s will, after all, is only and precisely what their Know Betters tell them it is.

The Wisconsin Supreme Court said, no, duly enacted law is still law, no matter how inconvenient that might be for this or that political party.

Here’s Ben Wikler, Progressive-Democratic Party of Wisconsin’s chairman, on that outcome:

Power grabs set a dangerous precedent, and anyone concerned about the health of a democracy should be working to fight against it[.]

No trace of irony there.

Wisconsin’s Democratic leaders are pondering their next steps…. Here’s a thought: accept the politically expressed will of your employers, even though you think yourselves better than they.  Leave the courts out of political matters.

An Out of Control Supreme Court Justice

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I received this email from the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee last Thursday [emphasis added].

E —
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has a powerful message about reproductive rights that every grassroots Democrat needs to hear:
“The decision whether or not to bear a child is central to a woman’s life, to her well-being and dignity. It is a decision she must make for herself. When Government controls that decision for her, she is being treated as less than a fully adult human responsible for her own choices.”
E, if you agree with Justice Ginsburg that women should be able to make their own health care choices, add your name now >>
Republican legislatures nationwide have spent the last few weeks passing extreme abortion laws, with the goal of getting the Supreme Court to reconsider Roe v. Wade.
But people are speaking out, fighting back, and holding rallies across the country with a clear message for Republicans: We won’t tolerate these attacks on women’s reproductive rights. As Justice Ginsburg says, women should be able to make their own decisions about their reproductive care.
Add your name now to stand with Ruth Bader Ginsburg if you agree that women should be able to make their own health care choices:
http://www.dscc.org/Stand-With-RBG
Thanks,
Team DSCC

The emphasized quote is what then-Supreme Court Justice nominee Ruth Bader Ginsburg said at her confirmation hearing.

There are a couple of things terribly wrong here. One is the plain pre-judging Ginsburg revealed then, her decision to announce what her ruling would be on any future abortion-related case that might come before the Court.  (Never mind that her pre-determined opinion entirely writes off the human right of a baby to its well-being and dignity, its right to live.)

But the other, even worse, if that’s possible, thing is a sitting Supreme Court Justice actively participating in politics—not in her personal role as citizen, but in her judicial role as Supreme Court Justice (of course, Ginsburg has a history of this with her disparaging statements about then-Presidential candidate Donald Trump).

Ginsburg has permitted a political campaign facility to use her statement in today’s political environment without that quote being noted as from that confirmation hearing.  Ginsburg has permitted the DSCC to imply that this is a current statement and that a sitting Justice has taken sides in a political contest.

That behavior is despicable.

Charging Assange

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Julian Assange, of Manning and Wikileaks infamy, has been indicted on violations of the Espionage Act in addition to the existing charges pending against him.

Naturally, the NLMSM is in an uproar over this putative attack on a free press.

…reignited debate over whether pursuing Mr. Assange for publishing classified information could lead to other cases against journalists who receive government secrets.

There are a couple of things on the NLMSM’s artificial dudgeon, though.  One is that a free press also has to be a responsible press—which includes respect for the law and acceptance of the consequences where the press engages in civil disobedience.  We’re all big boys and girls, though, the press’ and the Left’s contempt for us notwithstanding.  We’re fully capable of recognizing irresponsibility when we see it and disdaining pseudo-journalism when it’s presented.

The larger thing, though, is the role of law in our nation.  We’re either a nation of laws, or we are not.  We’re all equal under law, or some of us get special treatment—descending us into rule by law instead of rule of law.

The laws regarding receiving stolen goods are quite clear: that’s a crime, and the recipient(s) on conviction go to jail.  Except when it’s a journalist who receives the stolen property.  See, for instance, the news outlet that received and published the stolen Ellsberg papers, along with the hue and cry over holding Julian Assange—who’s not even a journalist, for all that he pretends to be—to the consequences from his having received the documents Manning had stolen and sent to him.

A free press requires journalists be allowed to break the same laws the rest of us must obey?  What’s the value of a press that cannot be trusted, that demonstrates its lawlessness by freely receiving stolen goods and profiting from the receipt by publishing the stolen material?

Here’s an alternative—a bare minimum of movement of the NLMSM back within the reach of the same laws the rest of us must obey.

Upon receipt of the stolen material, the news outlet and the receiving journalist must immediately return the originals of the material to the robbed entity and identify to law enforcement the person(s) and/or entity from which the material was received.  Upon return, the news outlet would be free to publish based on its copies of the stolen material.

Should the journalist or news outlet refuse, the journalist (or the news outlet’s chief editor, if the receiving journalist cannot be clearly identified) should be jailed until the originals are returned and the delivering person/entity identified.

Of course, overriding the above is whether the stolen material is classified (the Manning theft, for instance).  In this instance, the material and the receiving news outlet and its personnel would be subject to laws pertaining to (mis)handling classified material.

Yewbetcha

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Justice Clarence Thomas, on the matter of judicial precedent, as quoted by Myron Magnet in Thursday’s Wall Street Journal:

“Stare decisis is not an inexorable command,” Justice Thomas observes in [Franchise Tax Board v] Hyatt. He has said elsewhere: “I think that the Constitution itself, the written document, is the ultimate stare decisis.”

What he said.