Religious views properly may be a part of every judge's personal life but they should have no role in the conduct a trial or hearing when that judge puts on the black robe. Impartiality and dispassion are the very core of every judge's oath. This nominee has already indicated that her judicial integrity is jeopardized by her predisposed views.
For those who are inclined to flame with a discourse on the need for her traits in the judiciary, I pose a rhetorical question: How comfortable would you be and how would your respect for the judiciary be enhanced by knowing that your case is being presented to a judge who is inclined to impose on your case her own fervently held moral and religious views that may be contrary to your own for which she has already pubicly expressed disdain? The trust we place in our judges begins with our faith in their fairness and objectivity in every case, not just in those in which they hold no personal doctrine. Of course, the contrary is true.
You show where she has been overturned and there will be your proof that one with strong beliefs cannot still be judicially fair.
you're right! imagine if she took the Biblical injunction against murder and theft seriously. Man, she might have convicted some people, based on this extremist religious belief. shudder.
Because she is a Christian? Your premise is that only atheists can be impartial judges?
I see nothing intemperate in her remarks, unless you consider it intemperate to shine the cold light of reality into some murky corners.
It reminds me of a phrase I read somewhere about how "there shall be no religious test" for holding office in the United States. You might have read it too, somewhere but forgot that it applied to Justice Brown, et al.
You are absolutely wrong in the view of history, and nearly as goofy to be so absent common sense.
Religion is the basis for Judicial Oaths, as Blackstone wrote:
Basis of Judicial Oaths. The belief in a future state of rewards and punishments, the entertaining just ideas of the attributes of the Supreme Being, and a firm persuasion that He superintends and will finally compensate every action in human life, are the grand foundation of judicial oaths, which call God to witness the truth of those facts, which perhaps may only be known to him and the party attesting. All moral evidence, all confidence in human veracity [are] weakened by apostasy, and overthrown by total infidelity.Religious motive is stated as the ultimate basis for the complaints for cause listed in the Declaration of Independence (religious terms highlighted):
http://personal.pitnet.net/primarysources/blackstone.html
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. --That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
Consider how a Rabbi quotes the famous US Judge Learned Hand:
Freedom is not, as so many have thought, a matter of political or military victories alone. It involves "habits of the heart." Unless children know about Egypt and the exodus, they will not understand the entire structure of Jewish law. They will not grasp the fact that Judaism is an infinitely subtle set of laws designed to create a society of free individuals serving the free G-d in and through the responsible exercise of freedom. The American judge Learned Hand put it well:The men and women include Judges and Jurors, Legislator, Executive and Prosecutor, Lawyer and Police. All must operate according to the most fundatmental, precedent and primary of laws -- that of religion. Without that religious restraint and guidance applied by each individual in each duty -- public and private, any attempt at law and laws is folly, is doomed.I often wonder whether we do not rest our hopes too much upon constitutions, upon laws and upon courts. These are false hopes; believe me, these are false hopes. Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women; when it dies there, no constitution, no law, no court can save it; no constitution, no law, no court can even do much to help it. And what is this liberty which must lie in the hearts of men and women? It is not the ruthless, the unbridled will; it is not freedom to do as one likes. That is the denial of liberty, and leads straight to its overthrow. A society in which men recognize no check upon their freedom soon becomes a society where freedom is the possession of only a savage few; as we have learned to our sorrow.Chief Rabbi (England) Professor Jonathan Sacks, Thoughts on the Story of the Exodus (Parsha Bo)
That is a hell of a lot of words to say you believe this judge can't be impartial because she reads the Bible. Psycho-babble like this is what gives the one percent of good lawyers a bad name.
"Religious views properly may be a part of every judge's personal life but they should have no role in the conduct a trial or hearing when that judge puts on the black robe. Impartiality and dispassion are the very core of every judge's oath. This nominee has already indicated that her judicial integrity is jeopardized by her predisposed views."
What views are those? What issues did she discuss? What predisposition did she show? What impartiality are you seeing? Or are you seeing something other than dispassion? How so?
Can't say I agree with you here. People of faith are more likely to follow the rules and do not tend to be activists. They use their faith as a as a tool for moral restraint. It seem so me the more secular a judge the more activist that judge tends to be because of the lack of moral guiding principles. Additionally, people of faith do not believe in the idea of moral relativism, but rather they tend to rely on the traditions of the past and judicial precedence, things that activist judges don't really understand.