Posted on 02/22/2004 8:31:25 AM PST by spirithelps
Ruling could reverse citizens' right to sue
(Note from B: This case is about environmental law, but it hinges on accountability & redress: If it receives the attention it should, citizens will be demanding to know why their right to to sue the government should be (further) limited. Where should Constitutional burden of proof lie? It seems like every judge in the US should recuse themselves for conflict of interests and let a fully informed jury -- with power to decide issues of LAW as well as issues of fact -- decide.)
February 18, 2004 No author given (editorial) The Traverse City Record Eagle 120 West Front Street Traverse City, Michigan 49684 231-933-1467 Fax: 231-946-8632
To submit a Letter to the Editor: letters@record-eagle.com
In hearings last week before the state Supreme Court, lawyers for the Cleveland Cliffs Mining Co. asserted that a provision of Michigan's Environmental Protection Act of 1970 was unconstitutional.
The point being challenged was a portion of the act that says "the attorney general or any person" can sue the state for failing to enforce environmental laws.
While the company's claim wasn't earth-shaking, what drew headlines was the fact that a four-justice majority appeared to agree.
While there have long been some restrictions on citizen lawsuits at the state and federal level, there should also be no doubt that citizens reserve the right to sue their government to force it to do its job.
If the court strikes down the right of citizens to sue if they think the state isn't enforcing its own laws, that could open the door to restrictions on other forms of citizen oversight, such as the state's Open Meetings and Freedom of Information acts.
While exceptions to those acts exist, it is in citizens' best interests that courts rule as narrowly as possible on such exceptions.
The four justices in question, however -- Chief Justice Maura Corrigan, Justice Cliff Taylor, Justice Stephen Markman and Justice Robert Young, Jr. -- are known to take a narrow view of citizen standing to sue.
That seems to be an ideological devolution from the bedrock premise that the power of government derives from the consent of the governed.
Lawmakers can make laws because voters give them the right to do so.
Judges can throw people in jail because citizens say they can.
Without citizen consent, the government doesn't exist.
If anything, the justices should be demanding to know why citizen standing should be limited, not why it should be granted.
It's a form of judicial activism reminiscent of the liberal Earl Warren U.S. Supreme Court, but this time it is aimed at limiting the rights of individual citizens, not enhancing them.
And it's frightening.
Robust, contentious debate over the limits of government authority, the power and standing of individual citizens and how the two interact should be welcome.
But the starting point of any such debate must be the premise, enshrined in our most valued documents, that government authority flows from the people to government, not the other way around.
Citizens must have a way to hold their government accountable, to make it do its job.
To reverse an existing law that makes that right expressly clear, is to act counter to the idea that government is of, for and by the people, and not the other way around.
In the olden days, parties had to have standing to assert a claim and there had to be a real case-or-controversy before courts would wade in. The greenies and many other leftist groups didn't like that because it forced the courts to consider actual disputes with real issues before it rather than listening to policy advocates posing as litigants. It tends to make bad law and to get the courts thinking about themselves as little dictators. They are no longer deciding an actual dispute, they are setting policy.
Letting every tom dick and harry into court has been a key element in the leftist's assault on the constitution.
Another problem with letting anyone sue is that their lawyers get paid for 'acting in the public good' if they prevail. So what that creates is a cadre of leftist lawyers making up lawsuits 'in the public good.' They make a good living that way. Having this group out there with no need to have a real job is not a good thing.
Who is “any person”, a hate America firster from the UN or France? A despot like Saddam Hussein who is sitting on the second largest known oil reserves in the world, who could afford an army of attorneys to keep the US and its courts tied up for a century?
No thanks.
Sorta like "The Criminal Justice System"... Which you can take to mean two entirely different things!!!
Now I gotta go find that article by Thomas Sowell about "Busybodies" and link it here.
And right now, I'm inclined to withdraw my consent!
You and Grampa Dave are quite a pair!
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