Free Republic

Make up of the 13 federal appellate courts. There are currently 15 vacancies on the 11 numbered appellate courts plus the DC Circuit and the Federal Circuit. There are no vacancies on the First, Second, Seventh, Eighth, Eleventh, and Federal circuits. The Ninth has 4 vacancies, the DC circuit has 3, and with Judge Alito's promotion the 3rd circuit has 3. Of the 179 active judge positions, 60 have been appointed by Bill Clinton(33%). GW Bush has appointed 22%(39), Reagan 17%(30), GHW Bush 16%(28), Carter 3%(6), Nixon 0.5%(1). 8%(15) of the seats are vacant, with 3 nominations pending(Saad, Myers, and...

After a tough couple of weeks, Bush emerged from the failed nomination of Harriet Miers and the legal troubles of Scooter Libby to hit a home run as big as anything we saw by the White Sox. All that I know about Samuel Alito is what I have read and heard in the past several hours, and almost every objective analysis of Alito confirms what most conservatives want-a justice who does not believe that judges should make the laws.

Conservative strategists are drafting a letter to Democratic members of the Senate Judiciary Committee demanding the release of hundreds of internal memos detailing contacts between the lawmakers and liberal interest groups opposing John Roberts’ nomination to the Supreme Court. By planning to press Democrats on the sensitive subject, conservatives seem to be pulling a page from the Democrats’ own political playbook. In the weeks leading up to the confirmation hearings, Senate Democrats have repeatedly called on the White House to give them memos Roberts penned while he was deputy solicitor general in President George H.W. Bush’s administration. Sen. Patrick Leahy...

Senator Diane Feinstein today spoke a little about Supreme Court nominees, and what we can expect from the Senate Judiciary Committee hearings. She also let us in on what issues Liberals in the U.S. consider when they think of the rulings that affected them, and which they cherish the most. Feinstein told those gathered to hear her at a meeting of the L.A. County Bar Association that in her opinion the person chosen to replace Sandra Day O'Connor should be "balanced and Fair," and not come from either extreme. She then proceeded to give a history lesson to those gathered,...

Those who want to see judges who will apply the law instead of imposing their own policies face not only political obstruction to the appointment of such judges but also calculated confusion about the very words used in discussing what is at issue. Judges who impose their own preferences, instead of following the law as it is written, have long been known as "judicial activists" while those who carry out the law, instead of rewriting it to suit themselves, have been said to be following the "original intent" of the law. But now a massive effort to muddy the waters...

WASHINGTON - President Bush's deftly orchestrated Supreme Court announcement muffled a controversy over the leak of a CIA official's identity and put the president back on his political game, analysts said Wednesday. Whether Bush maintains control of the agenda in coming weeks depends largely on events outside of his control, such as the Senate debate over his nominee, John Roberts, and developments in the investigation of the Valerie Plame affair. As he strolled the colonnade outside the Oval Office with his newest nominee on Wednesday, Bush twice described himself as "confident." "I'm confident the senators will come to realize what...

Senators Edward M. Kennedy and Christopher Dodd urged the president to nominate a mainstream conservative for the Supreme Court at a news conference earlier this month. (Reuters Photo) WASHINGTON -- Senator Edward M. Kennedy's ringing baritone carried over the nearly empty Senate chamber, sounding a warning on a familiar subject. The liberal lion stood behind his desk in the chamber's last row and promised an aggressive and detailed grilling of whomever President Bush selects for the Supreme Court. .....Cooperation and comity aside, Kennedy has made it clear that he will not hesitate to lead an effort to block a nominee...

Perhaps Sen. Charles Schumer should have taken the Quiet Car. Here’s what the New York Democrat reportedly was overheard saying the other day on Amtrak: “Even William Rehnquist is more moderate than they expected. The only one that resulted how they predicted [was] Scalia. So most of the time they’ve gotten their picks wrong, and that’s what we want to do to them again.” Whether or not this quote from the Drudge Report is accurate, the sentiment is correct: The litany of conservative disappointments over Supreme Court appointments is a long one. Earl Warren. Harry Blackmun. John Paul Stevens. Anthony...

George W. Bush is loyal to his buddies. The gooder the good ol' boy, the better. It's one of the president's most endearing traits. He stood up for Alberto Gonzales on his way to the G-8 summit in Scotland, scolding the "extremists" on the right who are suspicious of the attorney general's credentials as a conservative nominee for the U.S. Supreme Court. "I don't like it when a friend gets criticized," the president told reporters at a stop in Denmark. "I'm loyal to my friends. And all of a sudden this fellow, who is a good public servant and a...

Certain seasons or events have historically spawned their own lexicons which are unique to those events and used almost exclusively to describe them. Late in the college football season, some games have what are unfailingly called, “serious bowl implications.” Likewise vice-presidential candidates must possess ''gravitas'' and Super Bowls oddly acquire roman numerals. So. too. does the Supreme Court nomination process require its own terminology, especially when the president is a Republican. Over the next several weeks there are a number of ordinary words and phrases that will be used ad nauseam in reference to whomever President Bush submits to the...

I Corinthians 3: 16 Don’t you know that you yourselves are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit lives in you?

We are prepared to release one or two flyers the day or two after President Bush announces his Supreme Court nominee. If you would like to be added to our ping list for flyer distribution, please let us know. Here is the list of flyers distributed by you and others to 10,000s of homes during 2004. Flyers

I will be glad and rejoice in You;I will sing praise to Your name, O Most High.My enemies turn back;They stumble and perish before You.For You have upheld my right and my cause;You have sat on Your throne, judging righteously.You have rebuked the nations and destroyed the wicked;You have blotted out their name for ever and ever. Psalm 9: 2-5

Five Supreme Court Justices with myriad educational degrees fumbled the simple meaning of the word “public”. Apparently the new meaning of the term “public use” is any use involving people. This is a brazen moving of the goal posts to rig the game in favor of powerful corporations and political interests. The Kelo vs. New London recision (it’s not a decision) is nothing less than a nail in the coffin of government by the people, for the people, and of the people. Here are five reasons why this has happened. BIG GOVERNMENT IS #1: The liberal wing of the Supreme...

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - Gays and lesbians won a major legal victory Wednesday when the California Supreme Court let stand a new law granting registered domestic partners many of the same rights and protections of heterosexual marriage. Without comment, the unanimous justices upheld appellate and trial court rulings that the sweeping measure does not conflict with a voter-approved initiative defining marriage as a union between a man and a woman. Justice Janice Rogers Brown, who leaves Thursday to join the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, did not vote. The domestic partner law, which was signed in...

Supreme court justices give their okie dokie to commercial land developers to sieze their homes and property and turn them into sprawling malls and bus stops.

Supreme Court Justices by a 5-4 ruling gave legal Authorization to commercial land developers, to sieze their property at any time for the good of economic development and the community.

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - California's Coastal Commission is not an illegal agency, the state Supreme Court ruled unanimously Thursday, a move that keeps officials from reconsidering four decades of land-use decisions along the 1,100-mile coastline. The justices were reviewing two lower-court rulings that said the 12-member commission was unlawfully formed by the Legislature in 1976. The lower courts ruled that because the agency carries out the will of the Legislature, lawmakers who appoint eight members have too much power over the agency and governor. The Supreme Court, however, ruled that the agency did not breach the so-called separation of powers...

“He has loosed the fateful lightening of His terrible swift sword. He has sounded forth the trumpet that shall never call retreat.” Those are two lines of “The Battle Hymn of the Republic“. Do they describe the current bunch of Republicans in Congress? As the Democrats continue to be mired in their out-of-power position, they have become more shrill, more audacious, more “in your face”. Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois even compared our service people holding enemy combatants in Guantanamo to Hitler, Pol Pot, etc. He is unrepentant, but this is usual for the leftists. The Democrat Party was at...

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - The California Supreme Court upheld state sentencing guidelines Monday amid challenges judges were unconstitutionally justifying steeper sentences based on elements not considered by the jury. Leaving intact the sentencing guidelines avoided what might have been the resentencing of thousands of prisoners. The decision was the third this year by California's justices interpreting new precedent established by the U.S. Supreme Court involving a hodgepodge of topics including sentencing, executing the mentally retarded and limiting the amount of damages jurors could award to punish business for egregious conduct in civil lawsuits. Ruling 6-1 Monday, the justices said California's...