Posted on 06/24/2005 1:13:50 PM PDT by Crackingham
Lawyers should speak up and explain the judicial process when judges come under attack, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy told members of the Florida Bar on Friday.
"When judges are attacked unfairly, it's proper for the bar over the course of time, in a professional and elegant way, to explain to the public the meaning of the rule of the law," Kennedy told several hundred lawyers attending the Florida Bar's annual meeting.
In the past year, the judiciary has come under attack from U.S. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, who openly criticized the federal courts when they refused to order the reinsertion of Terri Schiavo's feeding tube. Delay pointed to Kennedy as an example of Republican members of the Supreme Court who were activist and isolated. Other conservative critics have accused the courts of housing "activist judges," and in Chicago, the husband and mother of a federal judge were found murdered in her home. There's nothing wrong with criticizing cases, Kennedy said.
"We want a debate on what the law does and what it means," he added. "Judges aren't immune from criticism and neither are their decisions."
What is worrisome is when the criticism isn't just focused on a decision but at the judiciary, and increasingly, individual judges, he said. Lawyers can act as an intermediary between the decisions made by judges and the larger society by explaining, he added.
"When the judiciary is under attack, the bar disengaged, the public indifferent and critics scornful, then this idea of judicial independence might be under a real threat," Kennedy said.
Some critics believe that the idea of judicial independence gives judges the ability to rule however they want to, but the opposite is true, Kennedy said.
"Judicial independence is so that a judge can do what he has to do or what she must do," Kennedy said.
All I can say is that reigning in an arrogant judiciary is THE #1 domestic issue of our day, and it better damn well be THE big domestic issue in the '06 and '08 elections.
"Overturning judicial decisions isn't."
That would obviously require a Constitutional Amendment.
I think the collective judgement of several hundred elected officials, many of them attorneys themselves, is in many cases just as valid as that of the Supreme Court.
Securing the assent of Congress to review a Supreme Court decision would not be an easy matter, and in highly controversial cases, one which Congress would in all likelihood be more than willing to leave to the judgement of an unelected body.
The only impetus for such a review by Congress in the first place would be a major outpouring of public opinion against a Supreme Court decision.
And securing a 2/3rd majority of Congress on a subject, would, in all likelihood, require bipartisan support.
But it would at the same time provide an avenue to address any egregiously unconstitutional decisions by the Supremes.
I think we have a major problem with activist judicial opinions by the Supremes - especially when we have cases of some of these justices blatantly stating they should defer to foreign law practise in rendering decisions involving the interpretation of the American Constitution.
Well the line about the USSC in the USC is "The judicial Power shall extend to all Cases, in Law and Equity, arising under this Constitution." I think Congress's power to limit jurisdiction is for Appellate courts only. They can disband them. Not the USSC however which is mandated by the USC.
Total and complete B.S.
Try calling or sending an email to a federal judge, you won't get through to them and their assistant will tell you that it would be improper to talk to you or read your note.
They are High Princes in Black Robes with no accountability, and now they want lawyers in general to lecture the peon masses on how great they are.
Kennedy was nominated by Reagan.
Your rights + the Supreme Court of the United States = 0
If they don't decide you're "threatening" them with your note and turn you over to the FBI.
Well their job is to interpret the Constitution. The answer is to appoint better Judges. Impeachment obviously has no chance as there's no way you'd get the needed votes. You'd need Democrats voting for it much less RINOS.
He is a magistrate beseeching lawyers to use the legal system to attack anyone who criticizes the legal system. Didn't we have a little skirmish with these British fellows a while back? Whatever happened with that? Did we lose?
It's already done this to veterans. After the Civil War, Congress passed a law stating any veteran can sue the gov in a benefits dispute, but any lawyer in the case cannot be paid more than $10.00. That's why the American Legion handles disputes with the VA.
Congress can overrule any court decision at any time. It doesn't because we don't make it happen.
"When I use a word, it means what I want it to mean, nothing more and nothing less."
Can you imagine This AP lefty-zombie writing about Scalia and Thomas being called jack-booted Nazis, then moving directly to the Lefkowitz murder? It would never happen. Mr. Schneider lacks the ability t self-criticize, like 98% of his "colleagues."
I will not defend any Supreme Court justice who cannot resist the temptation to legislate from the bench or who seeks to impose on the American people foreign legal doctrines and laws that he, in his self-righteous progressive wisdom, believes are superior to what our elected federal and state legislatures have considered, debated, and passed.
He's smokin' crack.
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