Archive for category Judiciary
Leftist Shades of FDR–If you’re not worrying yet, then start!
Posted by Tom in Constitution, Judiciary, Statism on February 28, 2010
The past is indeed prologue. I cringed at the leftist thought process when reading Stan Isaacs article today in The Philadelphia Inquirer, Obama should expand the court. In other words, pack the court. Shame on me, I should not have cringed at all. We are governed by the radical leftist, the Constitution doesn’t matter, Obama appoints unconfirmed “tzars,” he rules, he dictates, checks and balances are meant to be evaded. “Reconciliation” is the latest example!
Comrade Isaacs correctly points out that the Constitution does not specify the size of the Supreme Court. The number of justices is set by Congress and has shifted between five and ten, but hasn’t budged from nine since 1869.
Some of us are too young to recall Roosevelt’s attempt to “pack the court” in the ’30s when the “nine old men” declared some of his New Deal legislation unconstitutional. In short FDR failed in his scheme. Isaacs suggest that Obama could “quarterback” a change loading the court with puppets doing his bidding. He further suggests that this is “change we could believe in!”
These people are dangerous, to the core. Pray for the sake of our country and our grandchildren that the Senate changes hands in November. The life appointments to the court, requiring Senate confirmation, are what ultimately guard our Constitutional values.
Tom Motherway
Sandoval’s Views on Judicial Legislation & Taxation?
Posted by Tom in Constitution, Judiciary, Nevada, Politics on December 1, 2009
Brian Sandoval’s rise in Nevada politics has been meteoric, so much so that he almost reminds me of that young fellow in Washington whose rise was built on blinding speed and little else. Although well grounded in the law and running as a candidate for the Republican nomination for governor, Sandoval should be prepared to explain his role as Governor Guinn’s Attorney General in 2003.
Some background is in order: In 1994 and 1996 Nevada voters overwhelmingly passed an amendment to the Nevada Constitution that required a 2/3 supermajority vote in the legislature to pass any tax increase. This amendment was added to a constitution that also required undefined funding for education.
In 2003 the Democratic majority in the legislature orchestrated a budget impasse by passing all budgetary items except for its proposed increase in funding in education which was blocked by over one third of the Assembly, all Republicans. The impasse continued through two special legislative sessions since the Democrats refused to cut the otherwise bloated budget and the Republicans refused to increase taxes.
Attorney General Brian Sandoval as the state’s chief legal officer advised Governor Guinn to sue the legislature in the Nevada Supreme Court. Sandoval personally delivered the petition to the high court seeking to get the court to intervene and get the increased public school budget passed.
Well, intervene the Supreme Court did, and in spades: In the infamous case of Guinn vs. Legislature, the court found a conflict between the two constitutional provisions and directed the legislature to ignore the 2/3 requirement and pass the increased taxes with a simple majority. The decision was ridiculed nationally by legal experts and by a majority of Nevada voters who found out that their vote meant nothing to Guinn and Sandoval. Governor Guinn a RINO would not face the press and had Sandoval take the heat. Sandoval’s explanation: “Everyone is going to have a different opinion on this, we just asked the court to require the legislature to balance the budget and fund education.”
The $836 million in additional taxes passed in 2003 produced such and embarrassing surplus that Guinn sought and got the Democrats to agree to a $300 million “give back” in 2005. The court’s decision was allegedly tainted by contact between Guinn and a couple of the justices so much so that Sandoval should have suspected the outcome before the petition was filed. The decision was subsequently repudiated by a succeeding Nevada Supreme Court.
The episode presents some serious questions as to Sandoval’s qualification for office.
Does Sandoval believe in the right of voters to expect that their vote means something? Over two thirds of the Nevada voters twice passed the constitutional amendment requiring a legislative super-majority to pass tax increases.
Does Sandoval believe in the separation of powers, legislative, executive and judicial provided by the Nevada and US constitutions? Legal scholars and the subsequent court decision confirm that courts have no more a right to compel legislation than governors do. Yet Sandoval asked the court to so compel the Nevada legislature. Political impasses demand political solutions–like budget cuts–which is exactly what the voters expected by passing the amendment twice!
Finally, and very troublesome, does Sandoval have any concept of economics and the effects of bloated state budgets and excessive taxes? His participation in the Democratic charade in 2003 would suggest he is as ignorant as Guinn in this regard.
I’m sure that the campaign for the nomination will vet these three important issues and more and I hope that our vigilant press will report them clearly and fairly.
Tom Motherway
‘Empathy’ in Action by Thomas Sowell on National Review Online
It is one of the signs of our times that so many in the media are focusing on the life story of Judge Sonia Sotomayor, President Obama’s nominee for the Supreme Court of the United States.
You might think that this was some kind of popularity contest, instead of a weighty decision about someone whose impact on the fundamental law of the nation will extend for decades after Barack Obama has come and gone.
Much is being made of the fact that Sonia Sotomayor had to struggle to rise in the world. But stop and think.
If you were going to have open-heart surgery, would you want to be operated on by a surgeon who was chosen because he had to struggle to get where he is, or by the best surgeon you could find — even if he was born with a silver spoon in his mouth and had every advantage that money and social position could offer?
If it were you who was going to be lying on that operating table with his heart cut open, you wouldn’t give a tinker’s damn about somebody’s struggle or somebody else’s privileges.
The Supreme Court of the United States is in effect operating on the heart of our nation — the Constitution and the statutes and government policies that all of us must live under.
Barack Obama’s repeated claim that a Supreme Court justice should have “empathy” with various groups has raised red flags that we ignore at our peril — and at the peril of our children and grandchildren.
“Empathy” for particular groups can be reconciled with “equal justice under law” — the motto over the entrance to the Supreme Court — only with smooth words. But not in reality. President Obama used those smooth words in introducing Judge Sotomayor, but words do not change realities.
Nothing demonstrates the fatal dangers from judicial “empathy” more than Judge Sotomayor’s decision in a 2008 case involving firemen who took an exam for promotion. After the racial mix of those who passed that test turned out to be predominantly white, with only a few blacks and Hispanics, the results were thrown out.
When this action by the local civil-service authorities was taken to court and eventually reached the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, Judge Sotomayor did not give the case even the courtesy of a spelling out of the issues. She backed those who threw out the test results. Apparently she didn’t have “empathy” with those predominantly white males who had been cheated out of promotions they had earned.
Fellow Second Circuit Court judge Jose Cabranes commented on the short shrift given to the serious issues in this case. It so happens that he too is Hispanic, but apparently he does not decide legal issues on the basis of “empathy” or lack thereof.
This was not an isolated matter for Judge Sotomayor. Speaking at the University of California at Berkeley in 2001, she said that the ethnicity and sex of a judge “may and will make a difference in our judging.”
Moreover, this was not something she lamented. On the contrary, she added, “I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn’t lived that life.”
No doubt the political spinmasters will try to spin this to mean something innocent. But the cold fact is that this is a poisonous doctrine for any judge, much less a justice of the Supreme Court.
That kind of empathy would for all practical purposes repeal the 14th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, which guarantees “equal protection of the laws” to all Americans.
What would the political spinmasters say if some white man said that a white male would more often reach a better conclusion than a Hispanic female?
For those who believe in the rule of law, Barack Obama used the words “rule of law” in introducing his nominee. For those who take his words as gospel, even when his own actions are directly the opposite of his words, that may be enough to let him put this dangerous woman on the Supreme Court.
Even if her confirmation cannot be stopped, it is important for senators to warn of the dangers, which will only get worse if such nominations sail through the Senate smoothly.
via ‘Empathy’ in Action by Thomas Sowell on National Review Online.