The End of American Exceptionalism: The Mediocre Mind's Fear of Being Different Is Now Supreme Law

The United States has long been regarded, and has long regarded itself, as different from other nations. This belief is a natural heritage for a country that regarded its founding not just as the start of one new nation, but as a "New Order for the Ages." Likewise, Americans have long considered the terms "New World" and "Old World" to be more than just geographical connotations. America is a country that set out to be different, to pioneer a way that the rest of the world could follow -- an individualistic way towards liberty, justice, and republican democracy. America had the confidence to be a trailblazer.

That ended last week. Like so much of the ongoing deconstruction of the Republic, it ended not by referendum, or an act of Congress, or even by an executive order of an elected President. It ended by a 5-4 vote of the Supreme Court. There was remarkably little protest after the decision, so perhaps it was correct. Perhaps America has become just one jurisdiction among many, no different than France or China or Botswana.

The case I'm referring to is Roper v. Simmons, in which the Supreme Court decided March 1st to overturn the laws of 20 states, and place a blanket prohibition on the execution of any person for crimes committed while 16 or 17 years old. Previously, states had been allowed to consider each murderer on a case-by-case basis, taking into account the character and heinousness of his particular crimes. The cruel could be judged differently than the impetuous. Those that were just a few days from their eighteenth birthday could be judged differently than those that had just turned sixteen. The Supreme Court decided that juries cannot make such individual decisions any longer.

Regardless of how you feel about the death penalty in general or its application to 16 or 17 year-olds in particular, consider the implications of the logic the Court used to arrive at this pronouncement.

The Court decided that such sentences are unconstitutional, in part, because being one of the 20 states in which they are permitted (containing 42% of the population) is sufficiently unusual -- compared to being among the 30 states in which they are not permitted -- that the sentences should be prohibited under the Eighth Amendment's ban on "cruel and unusual punishments." Simply being in the minority -- even a large minority -- is prima facie evidence of being wrong. A Constitutional protection intended to prevent capricious courts from sentencing people to being boiled in oil or burned at the stake was thus invoked to overturn the standing laws of 40% of our states -- laws that had been voted upon and signed by popularly-elected legislatures and governors. Knowing that 20 out of 50 can hardly be considered freakishly unusual, however, the court took their logic to an even more disturbing conclusion: such sentences must be wrong, it said, because they would make America different from the rest of the World.

I thought that was the whole point of America. But the Supreme Court disagrees. The laws of the United States, it has decided, are to be judged not just by our precedents and Constitution, but by the laws of all other nations as well. Apparently, truth is to be found in the middle of the pack and American law works best when averaged with that of other nations. The court will no longer be embarrassed by America being so exceptional.

Democracy in the 20 states in question -- New Hampshire, North Carolina, Texas, Utah, Arizona, Delaware, Kentucky, Florida, Alabama, Missouri, Virginia, Idaho, Mississippi, Nevada, Oklahoma, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Louisiana, Arkansas, and South Carolina -- is all well and good, the Court ruled, but how can that compare with the "African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child", the "Pact of San Jose", or the "United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child" (all cited in the decision)? Do we really want to have laws, the court so much as asked, that would meet with the disapproval of the "Human Rights Committee of the Bar of England and Wales"? The very thought makes me, of course, plum uncomfortable.

This is not the first time this court has used foreign law in its decisions, either. In a 1999 case, Justice Stephen Breyer cited a ruling of the Supreme Court of Zimbabwe, among other non-relevant sources, to bolster his claim that, because judges like he interfere in it so much, the death penalty should be banned altogether. He did not explain, however, how the court system of Zimbabwe is accountable to the voters of the United States. And in the 2003 case lifting state bans on Sodomy, Lawrence v. Texas, the court cited an act of the British Parliament, a ruling of the European Court of Human Rights, and provisions of the European Convention on Human Rights. Again, it is unclear how any of these institutions are relevant to the United States Supreme Court, except that they give the left-leaning Justices the kinds of laws they really want to rule by and save them the trouble of having to twist actual United States law so creatively.

America is justifiably proud of its tradition of the "Rule of Law". Under this principal, we are governed by known and clear rules -- agreed to in advance -- that apply equally to every citizen. But when Judges can capriciously choose from a grab-bag of the laws of any nation, without notice and without the input of America's citizens, we can no longer be said to live under the rule of law. Neither can we be said to be a democracy, for we are ruled by the laws of legislatures we did not choose and can never change with our votes. Worse yet, we are ruled not just by one unaccountable source, but by a strange amalgam of all foreign law. The goal apparently being to ensure that America neither leads nor lags, but seeks instead the anonymity and absence of responsibility of the crowd. America has been often described as a meritocracy, but under the rule of our new Supreme Court we might better be described as a "Mediocracy", a self-conscious nation engaged in a timid race toward the average. The fact that our Congress does nothing to correct the imposed Mediocracy can indicate only that it shares the Court's goal: an unexceptional America ruled by an interchangeable internationalist elite.

So let's see here. Our prohibition against self-incrimination and our presumption of innocence are rare in other judicial systems, as is our right to jury trials. So, we are going to give them up too?

The U.S. Supreme Court is a runaway court and needs to be reigned in. If we cannot have a court that only interprets what is Constitutional and not of "world opinion" then we have not Republic, we have no nation, and we have no America. All has been lost if this cannot be corrected.

Any judge, especially a Supreme Court Justic, who cites cited a ruling of the Supreme Court of Zimbabwe as his authority has violated the oath of his office, an oath to uphold a Constitution that recognizes no higher authority than the "Creator", a being these judges seem to think no longer has any relationship to their offices, nor to the law they deliberate on.

It appears that there is no appetite in the House, who would have to vote articles of impeachment, nor in the Senate, who would have to hold the trial, to impeach the Justices who look outside of the US for help in deciding US law.

How to fix this increasingly dishonorable Court?

We see the problem with lifetime tenure. We can only imagine the mischief a President could do if we had limited terms and a good judge had to be replaced. Missouri gives its voters the ability to vote a bad judge out of office. That of course would require a Constitutional amendment, a process that has a higher burdern of proof and support than does a successful impeachment.

For those willing to leave their nations behind, and come to America, exceptionalism was considered a good thing. Now, both back in those countries, and, right here, among an increasing faction of spoiled brats who are light years away from their own ancestors, exceptionalism is now regarded as some sort of "extremist religion" and "as dangerous as the mullahs!" Personally, I find those who are either ashamed of, or, more sinister, on a quest to destroy, American exceptionalism to be, themselves, a grave danger.

RE: It appears that there is no appetite in the House, who would have to vote articles of impeachment, nor in the Senate

Well then, let's give them the appetite. Phone calls, in-your-face at town hall meetings, etc.

The left has been systematically attacking all of the things which differentiate between peoples since World War II. Generally the motivations are either the pursuit of a mindset, susceptible to accepting World Government, or a compulsion to imagine that all peoples are equal, or both. This is just one more facet of a continuous and unrelenting assault. Why 5 Justices could be found to buy into it, should not surprise. That 4 did not, at least keeps a beacon of hope alive.

How does such a mindset differ from Communist theory? It really doesn't. But remember, a great many Leftists rejected Communism as impractical--or corrupt in its Bolshevik manifestation. They simply pursued other approaches to the same eventual goal. Therefore, it is not correct to call this a Communist decision. But the truth is, from a long range perspective, it might as well be.

I have been fighting against this absurdity all of my life. The new "enlightenment" of the Left, bedeviling the earth since the French Revolution, is getting very old indeed.

William Flax Return Of The Gods Web Site

This should be a litmus test question for every prospective new Supreme. On what will you base your rulings?

If he says the US Constitution, he's in. If he says the constitution, as understood through the lens of international law and international consensus of opinion, if he even hints at that between the lines, he should be disqualified for anything higher than traffic court.

Our prohibition against self-incrimination and our presumption of innocence are rare in other judicial systems, as is our right to jury trials. So, we are going to give them up too?

You can always pretend to be surprised when it happens...

While I cannot cite Section, para. etc., I know full well that the Constitution allows impeachment of judges, even SCOTUS judges! This is outrageous! How dare these embeciles cite foreign law! BTW, read the "Irrepressible Myth of Marbury by Michael Paulsen (Univ. of Ohio Law School. It will blow you away! Overturns the notion that SCOTUS is the FINAL arbiter of "what the law is".

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