Free Republic

It perhaps is an understatement to say that election night did not well for abortion activists. Planned Parenthood and other pro-abortion groups spent tens of millions of dollars on the election, but their massive spending did not succeed in convincing Americans to support the extreme pro-abortion policies of Hillary Clinton and others. Now, they are planning their defense. On Wednesday, Planned Parenthood CEO Cecile Richards told MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow that they are getting ready to fight for a U.S. Supreme Court nominee who supports abortion. A lot is at stake with the U.S. Supreme Court. One seat currently is open,...

Even before Donald Trump chooses a Supreme Court nominee, the new president can take steps to make several contentious court cases go away. Legal challenges involving immigration, climate change, cost-free contraceptive care and transgender rights all could be affected, without any help from Congress... The cases turn on Obama administration policies that rely on the president's pen, regulations or decisions made by federal agencies. And what one administration can do, the next can undo.

NEW YORK (AP) -- For the combatants in America's long-running culture wars, the triumph of Donald Trump and congressional Republicans was stunning - sparking elation on one side, deep dismay on the other. Advocates of LGBT rights and abortion rights now fear setbacks instead of further gains. But the outcome emboldened the anti-abortion movement and breathed new life into the religious right's campaign for broad exemptions from same-sex marriage and other laws. Kelly Shackelford, head of First Liberty Institute, a legal group that specializes in religious freedom cases, said that, for his cause, the environment will transform from "brutal" under...

Full title:So long Roe vs. Wade? President Trump's most lasting legacy could be radical change at the Supreme Court The election of Donald Trump as president means that there will be a conservative Supreme Court for years and maybe decades to come, but how much the court will move to the right depends on the health and stamina of Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Anthony Kennedy and Stephen Breyer. From 1971, when Richard Nixon’s third and fourth justices were confirmed, until February 2016, when Justice Antonin Scalia died, there have been at least five and sometimes as many as eight justices...

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., recommended on Friday that President-elect Trump nominate fellow former GOP presidential candidate, Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, to fill the vacant Supreme Court seat. . . . Trump has said he may consider nominating Cruz's Tea Party ally, Utah Sen. Mike Lee, who said he was not interested in the position. Goldberg said the same may be the case for Cruz, adding, "I don't think Cruz" wants the lifetime post.

"The seat that is sitting empty is being stolen. It's being stolen from the Obama administration and the construct of our Constitution and it's being delivered to an administration that has no right to fill it," Merkley said. . . . When pressed on his answer further, Merkley said he thought any nominee put forward by the president-elect in the next administration would be "illegitimate."

A common concern among Article V opponents is that society is too corrupt to be trusted with amending the Constitution. Perhaps they are right. If so, how did this corruption come about? Is it as bad as many believe? I say the corruption of our culture did not grow upward from the people; corruption rained downward from elites. I place the blame for societal corruption largely on scotus. Scotus not only regularly ignores or violates the written supreme law of the land, it often does the same with Natural Law, the Law of Reason. Scotus has normalized its judicial reach...

"I, John Glover Roberts Jr., do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God." - Oath of Office, September 29, 2005   https://www.c-span.org/video/?189112-1/roberts-swearingin-chief-justiceGenerically, an impeachment may be an inquiry into the integrity or validity of a practice, but with...

President-elect Donald Trump controls the future of the nation’s highest court, and the billionaire will likely push its ideology in a conservative direction that our nation hasn’t seen in decades. “Assuming that Donald Trump gets to replace more than one justice, this will be the most conservative Supreme Court we’ve had since 1937,” said Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the University of California, Irvine School of Law. “There will be a majority to overrule some fairly significant decisions.” Trump has late Justice Antonin Scalia’s seat to fill, but Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, 83, and Justice Stephen G. Breyer, 78, are nearing...

Justice Ginsburg Wears 'Dissent' Collar Following Contentious Election Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg appeared to be wearing her dissent "jabot" on Wednesday —one day after an incredibly divisive and contentious presidential campaign ended in the election of Donald Trump. Ginsburg wore the embellished collar ruffle meant to show disagreement and stray from the majority opinion on decisions before the high court. But there were no court decisions slated to go out on Wednesday. The Supreme Court did not return a request from NBC News for comment. Ginsburg has previously been frank on what she thinks of Trump. "I can't...

Sen. Mitch McConnell’s audacious — and roundly criticized — decision to block President Obama’s nominee to the U.S. Supreme Court pending the results of the presidential election has paid off handsomely for conservatives, who until this morning had every reason to suspect the end of their long-running project to reshape the court. Donald J. Trump’s victory means the court will almost certainly have a conservative majority for years to come. Challenges to regulation by administrative fiat, class-action lawsuits and restrictions on property use will find a more hospitable court, while laws restricting abortion and promoting the rights of religious organizations...

Donald Trump’s presidential victory preserves the Supreme Court’s narrow conservative majority by clearing the way for the new president to choose a jurist next year to fill the seat of the late Justice Antonin Scalia. And with Republicans maintaining control of the Senate, Trump will have a free hand in selecting someone with strong conservative credentials, confident his nominee will be confirmed. The election dashes the hopes of liberals, who lost their best opportunity in more than 40 years to create a majority on the high court.

Who is your pick for Trump's nomination to fill Anthony Scalia's vacancy on the SCOTUS?

President-elect will have chance to fill Scalia’s vacancy; as nominee, he said Second Amendment was ‘under siege’ Mark H. Anderson Updated Nov. 9, 2016 WASHINGTON—Republicans took a big gamble on the Supreme Court earlier this year when they shut down President Barack Obama’s effort to fill a vacancy created by the death of Justice Antonin Scalia in February. Now, it appears that extraordinary bet may pay off. President-elect Donald Trump will likely get the chance to fill the seat, putting up a nominee after he is inaugurated in January before a Senate that Republicans will control next year. One hurdle...

The underpinnings of a decent society are neutral laws -- laws that favor no particular individual or group -- and the impartial enforcement of those laws. The U.S. Supreme Court's job is to ensure the impartial enforcement of our laws. But our two presidential candidates differ in their visions of court appointees. Hillary Clinton says that she would "look broadly and widely for people who represent the diversity of our country" and that "we need a Supreme Court that will stand up on behalf of women's rights (and) on behalf of the rights of the LGBT community." In contrast, Donald...

The U.S. Supreme Court on Saturday reinstated an Arizona law that makes it a felony to collect early ballots, stepping into a contentious political issue days before the presidential election and dealing a blow to Democratic get-out-the-vote efforts. The unsigned order from the nation’s highest court overturns an appeals court decision from a day earlier that blocked the new law and drew celebration from Democrats. Groups immediately launched renewed efforts to help voters deliver their ballots to the polls, then stopped after the high-court ruling.

Scalia replacement From:chris.stone@opensocietyfoundations.org To: john.podesta@gmail.com Date: 2016-02-13 22:16 Subject: Scalia replacement Remember our discussion of Wallace Jefferson, Chief Justice in Texas? _________________________________ Christopher Stone President, Open Society Foundations

CNN)The Supreme Court on Saturday allowed an Arizona law barring organizers from picking up ballots and delivering them to election stations to remain in effect. The ruling is a blow to Democrats in the state who say the law could disenfranchise thousands of voters, especially in minority communities that rely upon neighbors and activists to collect and hand-deliver the ballots. Friday, a 6-5 ruling by the 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals granted a preliminary injunction of the law; the Supreme Court's order stays that decision. There were no noted dissents.

Playing third party roulette will garner SCOTUS appointees that side against an American heritage... or future Leading up to this election there is a dialogue occurring that jeopardizes the nature of America, and it’s coming from both the left and the right. The analyses of who should pilot the nation has gotten so mired in duckweed that “thinkers” have thought themselves into rationalizing the unthinkable. The make-up of a new Supreme Court is what would mirror the survival or failure of the United States. Hopefully, everyone can agree that the United States has a history. It was conceived, founded and...

A handful of Democratic-run cities are considering plans to allow non-citizens and illegal aliens to vote in elections, which would further strengthen Democratic incumbents and blur the differences between citizen and non-citizen. New York City, San Francisco, Chicago, and a handful of Maryland jurisdictions allow non-citizens to participate in some types of local or school elections. On November 8, San Franciscans will get to choose whether or not their sanctuary city that protects illegal aliens, including repeat criminals such as Kate Steinle’s alleged killer, from deportation, will also allow non-citizens to vote in school board elections. Similar measures failed in...