Posted on 02/23/2011 9:39:31 AM PST by Justaham
This cannot surprise anyone. I expect more and more savage progressive dictates from 0bama before his term is over.
“But will congress step up to this? I have reservations about this.”
Oh, I have no doubt that some will. It’s my understanding that any member of Congress can step in on the defense of a law that Congress passed. It doesn’t take a vote.
Thanks for the case law!
Does anyone else have standing to defend what this Usurper-in-Chief won’t?
My understanding is that in the case in question, the Federal law part of the statue is struck down, meaning "married" homosexuals in Massachusetts will be able to be recognized by the federal government for government bennies - social security survivor benefits, file jointly on tax return, etc. States will still purportedly be able to not observe fake marriages. But, of course, this is an eroding of the damn. It will eventually be construed to mean portability of these fake "marriages" from other states into the 35 states that don't recognize them.
"A 530d letter has been sent to Congress informing it that, if it wants to defend the statute, it is free to do so. A case is pending now that has a filing deadline of March 11."
I'm wondering if this means either house, or a resolution by both houses?
I don't know about you guys, but this is making me sick to my stomach.
Of course the only check on presidential power is political. Welcome to
republican government. That's in the nature of the beast. And by the way, Marbury doesn't hold what you apparently think it holds.
I don’t agree. The President could immediately ask for a repeal from Congress.
But, he could only WITHDRAW funding from his Cabinet agencies for implementation as an immediate action. That could be handled by a Presidential directive. Ask Zero how handy that Pres. directive is BTW.
yes, eseentially that is correct.
Obmabi just singalled he is not going to stop them (not going to enforce the law, and gave up defending the law in the lawsuit)
Can someone file a Writ of Mandamus to force them to do their job?
Obama has no authority to decide what is constitutional. He is usurping the powers of the Supreme Court, which is the body appointed precisely to determine what is constitutional and what not. This clever ploy of announcing that the President and his Justice Department have decided on their own that a law is unconstitutional is probably meant to keep it from ever being submitted to Supreme Court review. Wake up and smell the sulphur, folks. Obama has NO authority to do this. He is trying to wrest authority from the Judiciary, which is exactly what Hugo Chavez and every tinpot dictator in Latin America and Africa has done.Worth Repeating.
I'm not sure what's greater - your arrogance, or the fallibility of your clairvoyant power.
What I know with respect to the central legal holding of Marbury, is that Marshall's opinion establishes, for the first time in American jurisprudence, the principle of judicial review.
My point, was that it wasn't (your words) "just a court case", but in fact an event that quite literally changed the course of American history.
Marbury is often cited in support of the principle of judicial review. In fact, however, it had nothing to do with judicial review in the modern sense. Marshall's holding was only that courts have to determine what laws are constitutionally valid for the narrow purpose of determining their own rules of decision. Marbury couldn't get the relief he requested from the courts because the statute he based the request on wasn't constitutional. Courts get to determine for themselves what their duties are under the Constitution. Fair enough, who could argue otherwise; hardly a world altering event.
Nothing in Marbury even suggests that the Supreme Court can tell the other branches of government what their constitutional responsibilities are. Courts, as Marshall observed, have to decide what they need to do to comply with the Constitution. So do Presidents (and for that matter Congresses).
The idea that the Executive branch has to dance to whatever tune judges choose to play is profoundly anti-constitutional. That isn't Marbury, it is modern leftism. Progressives have found the notion of judicial supremacy useful ever since the 50’s and that notion is as destructive of our constitutional order as every other aspect of progressivism. Obama is doing that notion a great deal of damage, it's an ill wind that blows nobody any good.
The Constitution doesn't make the Executive subordinate to the courts. The branches are equal, but the Executive with its monopoly on physical force is more equal than the others and all three are subordinate to the people. That's what the document says and that, by and large is how it has been understood for a couple of centuries.
To paraphrase RR, the problem isn't what you don't know, it's what you know that just isn't right.
Thanks you explained it well
Thanks dude.
Thanks K
When I got the Fox News alert about this earlier, they had redubbed it the Defense of Anti-Gay Marriage Act. FNC, looking out for us.
BRAVO!
I think the question here is that the Executive is deciding that a law validly enacted by the Legislative Branch is on the face of it unconstitutional and doesn’t need to be followed. They are putting the burden on the people who created and approved the law to defend it - after it had already been passed and signed into law.
I don’t see how there is any precedent that allows the Executive to simply ignore a legitimate law. Obama and the gang could find a test case if they wanted to and then bring a challenge. But why should the burden be on the Legislative Branch to defend a law that it has already approved and in fact has been signed by the Executive? How can a new office holder simply decide that all bets are off, he doesn’t like the law, and he’s simply not going to abide by it?
If the Executive Branch and its legal arm get to do this, then we’re in banana republic territory. This is exactly what they do in Latin America. I have spent many years watching this happen. The attack on the judiciary, particularly the constitutional court, is the hallmark of a dictator.
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