Free Republic

With U.S. policymakers distracted by the situation in Honduras, Nicaragua continues to move toward authoritarianism. On October 19, a Nicaraguan Supreme Court panel overturned a constitutional provision limiting presidents to two non-consecutive terms in office. The ruling will allow incumbent Nicaraguan president Daniel Ortega--the Sandinista party leader, former Soviet client, vociferous critic of the United States, and current Hugo Chávez acolyte--to run for another term in 2011. If there were any doubts that Nicaraguan democracy is slowly being extinguished, this latest development should remove them. The Nicaraguan Supreme Court is composed of 16 members. Thanks to a political deal made...

Couric: Let's take a look at what you said recently regarding the upcoming Supreme Court decision on your health care legislation: “I’m confident that the Supreme Court will not take what would be an unprecedented, extraordinary step of overturning a law that was passed by a strong majority of a democratically elected Congress.” You claim it would be "unprecedented" if the justices overturn this law. But isn't that the proper role of the courts, and hasn't it happened many times before? Obama: Clearly, I was talking about important laws like this, which were enacted during my administation. So since...

When the U.S. Supreme Court is in session, each Wednesday and Friday afternoon is set aside for an esoteric conclave known as the Justices' Conference. During these private meetings, the justices discuss cases they have recently heard or might decide to hear. The first order of business usually involves the latter, requests from various litigants for the high court to review cases that have been adjudicated by lower courts. Typically, these cases have already been through the appellate process, but occasionally the justices receive a "petition for certiorari before judgment" asking them to consider the decision of some District Court...

Juror's research led to murder mistrial By Bob Kalinowski (Staff Writer) Published: January 17, 2011 Legal experts have coined them "Google mistrials." Curious jurors seeking to conduct their own research surf the Internet about facts presented in court, bringing a halt to important court cases and tainting the outcome. Sometimes it's done unwittingly. Other times it's done against a judge's specific directions. On Friday, it ended Lamont Cherry's murder trial in Luzerne County court. A juror admitted to researching medical issues at home on her computer after five hours of deliberations Thursday ended in a deadlocked panel, prompting a cloud...

NASHVILLE, Tenn. – Don't expect a Facebook friend request from Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer any time soon. The 72-year-old justice said in a speech at Vanderbilt Law School on Tuesday that he was perplexed when he recently saw the film "The Social Network" about the origins of Facebook. But Breyer said the film illustrates his argument that modern conditions — like the development of the social-networking site — should inform justices when interpreting a Constitution written in the 18th century. "If I'm applying the First Amendment, I have to apply it to a world where there's an Internet, and...

Results of the recent elections showed that growing numbers of Americans are fed up with “public servants” who act as if they are public masters. This went beyond the usual objections to particular policies. It was the fact that policies were crammed down our throats, whether we liked them or not. In fact, laws were passed so fast that nobody had time to read them. Whether these policies were good, bad, or indifferent, the way they were imposed represented a more fundamental threat to the very principles of a self-governing people established by the Constitution of the United States. Arrogant...

Gay marriage support knocks 3 Iowa justices off the bench Comments November 4, 2010 DES MOINES, Iowa -- Iowans voted to remove three state Supreme Court justices, siding with conservatives angered by a ruling that allowed gay marriage. Justices Marsha Ternus, David Baker and Michael Streit will be removed after about 54 percent of voters backed their ouster -- the first time Iowa voters have removed a Supreme Court justice since the current system began in 1962. They were on the court of seven justices who unanimously decided last year that an Iowa law restricting marriage to one man and...

WASHINGTON (AP) - The Supreme Court says the Constitution's "right to keep and bear arms" applies nationwide as a restraint on the ability of government to limit its application

As Congress gears up to do battle over Elena Kagan's nomination to the Supreme Court, Americans are struggling to identify the names of her would-be colleagues... Two-thirds of the 1,000 American adults polled couldn't name a single current justice, and just 1 percent were able to name all nine sitting justices. The largest proportion of respondents were able to name Clarence Thomas, at 19 percent; Chief Justice John Roberts was next with 16 percent. Bringing up the rear were Anthony Kennedy — the pivotal swing vote in many high court decisions — with 6 percent, and Stephen Breyer, who rang...

<p>WASHINGTON – Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens, the court's oldest member and leader of its liberal bloc, he is retiring. President Barack Obama now has his second high court opening to fill.</p> <p>Stevens said Friday he will step down when the court finishes its work for the summer in late June or early July. He said he hopes his successor is confirmed "well in advance of the commencement of the court's next term."</p>

American Minute for March 24th: William Jay, son of the First Supreme Court Chief Justice, helped found New York City's Anti-Slavery Society in 1833. His son, John Jay, was manager of New York Young Men's Anti-Slavery Society in 1834. Supreme Court Justice Joseph Story helped establish the illegality of the slave trade in the 1844 Amistad case. Salmon P. Chase, appointed Chief Justice by Lincoln, defended so many escaped slaves in his career he was nicknamed "Attorney-General of Fugitive Slaves." Cassius Marcellus Clay, diplomat to Russia for Lincoln and Grant, founded the anti-slavery journal True American in 1845 and helped...

THE FIVE THAT STAND AGAINST ALL AMERICANS, THE “MAFIA” JUDGES By Gordon Duff STAFF WRITER/Senior Editor Five members of the Supreme Court declared that a “corporation” is a person, not a “regular person” but one above all natural laws, subject to no God, no moral code but one with unlimited power over our lives, a power awarded by judges who seem themselves as grand inquisitors in an meant to hunt down all hertics who fail to serve their god, the god of money. Their ruling has made it legal for foreign controlled corporations to flush unlimited money into our bloated...

Counting the majority opinion and the various partial concurrences and dissents, today’s landmark First Amendment decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission clocks in a hefty 183-pages. But one thing that jumped right out while reading the dissent (it’s also a concurrence, in parts) written by Justice John Paul Stevens and joined by Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer, and Sonia Sotomayor, is Stevens' angry tone. He calls the idea that the First Amendment forbids distinctions between individuals and individuals organized as a corporation “a glittering generality” with no foundation in the law, and later declares, “Under the majority's...

A prominent pro-life organization has thrown down the gauntlet before a majority of the U.S. Supreme Court justices. The Supreme Court's fall/winter session is just gettingunder way. The challenge comes from Judie Brown, president of the American Life League (ALL). "Now that we have six people on the Supreme Court out of nine who claim to be Catholic," she notes, "we'd like for them to take the opportunity to address the reality of who it is who lives in the womb from the moment that his or her life begins, and then take action to overrule themselves so that the...

Recent diatribes have appeared in the media criticizing and misrepresenting the rationale of those opposed to the Sotomayor nomination to the Supreme Court. Sotomayor has been lauded ad nauseam for her desire to be empathetic in her adjudication, and many have remarked unceasingly about the impressiveness of her "life experience." Empathy and "life experience" are certainly wonderful virtues. But are they most appropriate for a social worker or for a judge? Our own legal icon, Lady Justice, wears a blindfold and holds balanced scales in her hand. There is no room for favoritism in adjudication, and the idea of judicial...

Adesperate — and ridiculous — claim that Sonia Sotomayor would not be the first Hispanic justice to take the U.S. Supreme Court bench is very revealing. There are actually people claiming with a straight face that Benjamin Cardozo, appointed to the court by Herbert Hoover in 1932, was the first Hispanic justice.

JUDGES should interpret the Constitution according to other nations' legal "norms." Sharia law could apply to disputes in US courts. The United States constitutes an "axis of disobedience" along with North Korea and Saddam-era Iraq. Those are the views of the man on track to become one of the US government's top lawyers: Harold Koh. Obama has nominated Koh -- until last week the dean of Yale Law School -- to be the State Department's legal adviser. In that job, Koh would forge a wide range of international agreements on issues from trade to arms control, and help represent our...

President Barack Obama / Leonard A. Leo Washington DC, Feb 1, 2009 / 07:55 pm (CNA).- Confirmation hearings for President Barack Obama’s Department of Justice nominees are reportedly proceeding so quickly that Republicans and outside groups are unable to make meaningful criticisms of their intense support for abortion rights and other moral issues. One critic said the nominations portend the most “Culture of Death” justice department in American history.“We are on the brink of having the most Culture of Death, anti-family Justice Department ever,” Leonard Leo, former Co-Chairman of the Republican National Committee Catholic Outreach and Chairman of Students...

WASHINGTON (Legal Newsline)-The U.S. Supreme Court reconvenes next week for a term that will be conducted under the backdrop of November's presidential election. Among cases to be heard by the high court is whether pharmaceutical companies may be sued for patient injuries, if the Federal Communications Commission may restrict foul language on broadcast television, if the Navy can be barred from using sonar off the California coast and whether local officials can be sued for violations that took place on their watch.

WASHINGTON - All five Roman Catholic justices on the Supreme Court were invited to Wednesday night's splashy White House dinner in honor of Pope Benedict XVI. Republican presidential contender John McCain will be there, too. But Democratic rivals Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama, who had a nationally broadcast debate scheduled Wednesday night, were not invited. About 250 guests were to attend the dinner. Benedict will not be there because he will be attending an evening prayer service with U.S. bishops. The guests include former Los Angeles Dodgers baseball manager Tommy Lasorda, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, House Minority Leader John...