 Cynthia Tucker |
Posted on 04/03/2005 6:42:45 PM PDT by Gondring
Friends of Florida judge George Greer describe him as a low-key conservative Christian, a Republican, a family man, a dog lover. Appellate courts have found over and over again that Greer simply followed the law in deciding a sad and controversial case. But for that sin, the Pinellas County Circuit Court judge was invited out of his Southern Baptist Church.
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Apparently, Greer's critics, including his pastor, didn't like his rulings in the Terri Schiavo case, which landed in his courtroom in 1998. They wanted him to be an activist judge -- a jurist who ignored the law and ruled according to the passions of a group of partisans.
Ultraconservatives want you to believe the term "activist judge" applies to a group of determined liberals whose rulings have overturned historic precedent, undermined morality and defied common sense. But the controversy that erupted around Schiavo, who died on Thursday, ought to remind us once and for all what "activist judge" really means: a jurist whose rulings dissatisfy a right-wing political constituency.
Over the next few months, you'll hear the term "activist judge" often as President Bush nominates justices to the U.S. Supreme Court. The president could end up appointing as many as four. Chief Justice William Rehnquist, 80, is ailing with cancer; John Paul Stevens is also an octogenarian. Sandra Day O'Connor and Ruth Bader Ginsburg are cancer survivors in their 70s.
With so many likely vacancies, ultraconservatives see an opportunity to drive from the bench any semblance of fealty to the law or the U.S. Constitution. They claim that judges have become the tool of an outlandish liberal fringe that has violated the graves of the Founding Fathers. When right-wing talk-show hosts and U.S. senators denounce judicial activism, they conjure up images of jurists who terrorize the God-fearing, coddle criminals and would -- according to one crazed campaign memo passed around during last year's presidential campaign -- outlaw the Bible.
The next time you hear those claims, think of Judge Greer, whose politics tilt to the right. He is among the targets of ultraconservative ire.
For that matter, think of the current Supreme Court -- hardly a bastion of liberalism. Its justices declined to intervene in the Schiavo case because they could find no legitimate reason to do so.
While the rift between Michael Schiavo and his in-laws, Bob and Mary Schindler, is depressing, family conflict is almost a way of life in America. Courts are called upon often to settle family disputes over money, children and property. Florida law makes clear that a spouse has the right to decide end-of-life issues, and, after testimony from several people, Greer upheld Schiavo's claim that his wife didn't want to be kept alive through artificial means.
It is perfectly understandable that the Schindlers were unhappy with his ruling. As grieving parents, they wanted to believe, contrary to the judgment of several physicians, that their daughter might one day be miraculously restored.
But the attacks on the judiciary by the Schindlers' supporters -- including an attempted end-run by an activist Congress -- made it clear that a minority of religious extremists have no respect for the law and no understanding of the separation of powers on which this government was founded.
Among those who missed their high school civics class, apparently, were Congress and the president. In one of many rulings turning down the Schindlers' request for intervention, an Atlanta federal court judge chastised the executive and legislative branches for overreaching.
"Congress chose to overstep constitutional boundaries into the province of the judiciary. Such an act cannot be countenanced," wrote Judge Stanley Birch, who was appointed by former President George H.W. Bush. Hardly a liberal activist.
The current President Bush has already made clear that his idea of a model chief justice is Clarence Thomas, who has no respect for judicial precedent. But even Thomas might not satisfy the extremists who chastise Judge Greer. They will be satisfied with nothing less than a judiciary steeped in the same narrow religious views they want to impose on the nation.
Cynthia Tucker is editorial page editor for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. She can be reached by e-mail: cynthia@ajc.com.
All I know is a judge decided to overlook therapy that could been delivered to Terri for 10 years which may have benefited the now deceased. And refused to grant guardianship to people who obviously demonstrated a deep love for her and refused.
Whether this judge is a christian is not for me to judge. However, history proves there were quite a few goose-stepping Nazis who professed christianity or hide behind the "Christian" moniker. You may be christian via culture or by "designation" but that's a heck of alot different than Christian by Salvation.
This chick has no clue what she's saying. And frankly, I don't care what she thinks. It's not important.
If Universal Health Care passes, that's exactly what we'll have. The government will decide all life and death decisions because your care will be publicly funded. This is what the left wants. Killing Terri would be considered politically correct. She would be considered a useless eater depleting the resources of the great collective.
That's why the left wing MSM has been spinning the facts about the Terri case to support the husband. They want the disabled out of the way.
Your refusing to eat, drink or take medicine is one thing. A judge ordering that you can't be fed, given drink or medicine is entirely another.
If Mrs. Schiavo had requested food, it could have been given. But force-feeding her--after her husband had decided that based on what he knew of her she wouldn't want it, and based on court decisions that she wouldn't have wanted it--is just plain wrong. And you are distorting the "natural means" decision.
Nick,
What is your answer to the conundrum of why we should want Terri Schiavo to endure an existence that 98% of us would refuse for ourselves?
It will solve the Social Security problem when all us boomers get old for sure :(
I tend to agree that the above is correct. It should send chills down our spines. Regardless of the other merits or flaws in the arguments being put forward on both sides.
okay...so your post clearly shows that the Congress has the right to ordain and establish FEDERAL courts...not State ones.
Thank you for demonstrating that for those who can't understand WHY it's such a BAD idea for the Feds to nose around in state matters!
Any court? Uh, yeah, right..citation, please.
No, the judge ordered no food or water.
Pro-Life-at-Any-Cost?
Speak for yourself. Both I and my husband, my sister and her husband, said we'd want to live if we were Terri.
It sounds like you're projecting your will on to Terri because there was no clue what she wanted. You're deciding for her, just like her husband and Judge Greer.
It's wasn't your choice, nor was it the husbands or Greer's choice, but the two decided death for her anyway.
Better off dead, right?
I still believe that everyone is missing one of the nastier subtexts of this case. I think Felos and Greer hometowned the opposition. It was a wink and a nod and greer gave the lawyer he knew what he wanted for his client. Once the "facts were established" then the appelate courts had nothing to do but affirm. When Jeb Bush signe FL's terri's law, Greer was basically going to always affirm his prior finding.
There has to be a way to reform the judiciary to deal with cronnyism as much as a judge who ignores the law.
BTW sometimes a person becomes a judge more for peter principle rather than competence. Being a judge in FL have very little to do with actual legal knowledge compared to POLITICAL knowledge.
The "mistake" of choosing life can be corrected.
The "mistake" of choosing death cannot.
I don't disagree with a thing you said. Pity the facts, or lack thereof, or conflict therein, in the Terri case raise other and more troublesome issues, such as uncertainty, conflict among relatives, motivation, and a certain clanking, clanking sound emanating from gear shifts in the law.
If a person decides to have their feeding tube pulled so they may die that is a different case.
If a person can not communicate and a guardian decides, after all hope is gone, that a feeding tube is to be pulled that is a different case.
Terri could have communicated her wishes- she was not allowed to. Her Guardian had a conflict of interest and would benefit from her death. There are numerous questions about how Terri got into that condition in the first place AND her parents wanted to care for her.
Thanks to the internet- and a large group of bloggers and Freepers Terri's case became familiar to us over the last four or so years. The case is so clearly a right to kill case and many people have issues with that. That is what makes her different.
The side that wished to keep Terri Schiavo strapped in that bed forever constantly pretends that TS suffered as any normal person would if starving to death. This is untrue and disingenuous. When you have no cerebral cortex you can't experience sensory input as a healthy person would. She has been effectively unconscious for at least 13 years. Any reputable neuro surgeon will tell you this just as they are all familliar with the open eyes that can follow light, the unintelligible sounds that are made, the fact that they sleep and wake. Now if you want to quote the quack Hamasphar (sp?) go ahead but most now know the man is a joke.
The endless living death advocates crow about the few seconds of video tape we have all seen. They conveniently do not talk about the five hours where she lies there like a dead person. Why don't we ever see the five hours?
Good point... Like the brigades of Randall Terry followers who have not read the reports or transcripts or the law, etc....you know, the ones who insist on citing Hammesfahr and claiming he was Nobel-nominated, etc., despite his claims being totally discredited.
Check out FReeper Trinity_Tx's page for a good compilation of info. It has links to original documents that clear up the lies that have been told to support Schindlers' spurious claims. Note that "terrisfight.org has removed some of the more embarrassing documents..such as the discharge papers from the hospital, which show that Mrs. Schiavo did NOT have a head injury, and that the feeding tube was inserted at the hospital, not "at Michael's request for the convenience of the nurses," etc.
I must be getting old. I recall back when "bearing false witness" was a sin (not to the "Modern Christian Activist," I guess), and conservatives fought for the truth, not lies and distortions. O Brave New World!
Sorry but NOWHERE in anything i posted previously even mentions anything federal but it sure does point to the states and judges
Fix your reading glasses !
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