Posted on 08/05/2004 5:34:03 AM PDT by MainFrame65
He doesn't like stare decisis? Conservatives have let the libs get away with it for too long. Its not simply good enough to leave the liberal legal edifice standing, it must be rolled back. Justice Thomas knows better than the Left about the rule of law.
I doubt that Scalia doesn't believe in stare decisis. He just thinks that the bulk of the Court's decisions have been wrong in recent years, and deserve reversal even considering stare decisis. If you don't believe in stare decisis, then there is no point in having a Supreme Court, because its decisions are meaningless except to the particular case before the court. Of course, that is how they do it thru much of Europe, but we aren't Europe.
I am extremely ignorant concerning stare decisis. What is this?
"I am extremely ignorant concerning stare decisis. What is this?"
It means "Let's leave bad decisions in place because the guys who made the bad decisions were smarter than us," or something like that.
Scalia's remark -- that his fellow justice does not believe in the key principle of our society's rule of law -- deserves more attention.
STARE DECISIS - Latin.... "to stand by that which is decided." The principal that the precedent decisions are to be followed by the courts.
For anyone who believes that stare decisis is "the key principle of our society's rule of law" I can only say.......
Dred Scott.
http://www.lectlaw.com/def2/s065.htm
I don't think stare decisis can be absolute. A court may make a ruling, and more evidence may be brought forth at a later time. Is that new case different, or would it amount to a violation of the 'stare decisis' principle?
Did you mean "Thomas" not "Scalia?"
The article states:
"Thomas, says Scalia, "doesn't believe in stare decisis, period."
"If a constitutional line of authority is wrong, he would say let's get it right," says Scalia. "I wouldn't do that."
So, your statement is confusing to me, unless it is "Thomas" you are referring to.
Ooopps. Read it too fast. I doubt that Thomas does not believe in stare decisis.
Dred Scott.
Good point.
Absolutely.
That was my first thought. There have been others almost all of which tend to a more liberal interpretation the second time around.
"In the end Thomas and Hill remained the only two people who knew what transpired between them, and each told a different story," Foskett writes, noting that the two had a social relationship of some form before they worked together."
I've always believed Thomas and Hill had an intimate relationship, and that Ms Hill "lost it" when Justice Thomas fell in love with a caucasian woman.
The fact the last time Ms Hill ever called Clarence Thomas was the day he got married speaks volumes to me.
Stare decisis is a foundation of the rule of law. Not the foundation, but one of them. We need it for the courts' opinions to have any consistency at all. But the Supreme Court is where the buck stops. And when five of them decide to exterminate 40 million Americans, it behooves another five, later on, to stop it.
"So he doesn't believe in stare decisis. Big deal. And the other Gods in Black who decree that gays can marry each other DO?
Stare decisis is a foundation of the rule of law. Not the foundation, but one of them. We need it for the courts' opinions to have any consistency at all. But the Supreme Court is where the buck stops. And when five of them decide to exterminate 40 million Americans, it behooves another five, later on, to stop it."
Yep. Its amazing this the "the issue" out of the entire book, apparently.
Sounds to me like this author doesn't like Thomas, and is trying to paint him as a right wing nut job - for trying to remedy any of the leftist rulings of the Courts made in the last 100 or so years. My, my. How unappealing even the slightest hint of judicial activism appears to this author when it might be used to restore conservative principles to our law, rather than to continue their destruction.
Note this authors depiction of Limbaugh's comments later on -- as rants that suited Thomas' anger well.
The discover of this bombshell seems to have an agenda with which I can not concur.
Good point.
To amplify, we must remember that the "key principle of our society's rule of law" is the Constitution.
The Constitution, sacrosanct as it is in our society, recognizes human fallibility and provides a mechanism for it's amendment.
A belief in an absolute stare decisis, however, elevates mere mortals in judicial robes, often chosen for highly partisan political reasons that were relevant one or two centuries ago, to the status of legal gods whose pronouncements must not be questioned.
Thus, we have become a nation ruled, not by the Constitution, but by men and women in robes inventing concepts such as "penumbras" to make the Constitution mean whatever they please regardless of the Constitution's text or original intent. We may as well be ruled by the ancient priests of the Oracle at Delphi finding meaning in chicken entrails.
If there is one Justice who wants to return to the rule of law under Constitution at the expense of the rule by the sacred decisions of unelected men in robes, many of them long since dead, that is a good thing.
This is so lame for liberals to whine about this.
They are the original ignorers of stare decisis.
Can anyone say "Roe v. Wade"? Or how about all of the civil rights laws which struck down segregation?
It's the old "it's right when I do it but wrong when you do it" idea. Apparently Liberals are the only ones possessed with enough moral ability to override precedent.
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