Posted on 01/09/2006 8:26:54 AM PST by PatrickHenry
Actually, the goals of the 14th Amendment appear to have been rather modest. The Equal Protection Clause didn't even give blacks or women the vote. It took additional constitutional amendments to achieve that. In the case of women, the amendment was added 50 years later.
The 14th's vagueness, however, has been a source of much of the left's abuse of judicial power. Basically, they've used the 14th to flip our system of government upside down. Instead of protecting the states and restraining the federal government, the Constitution, thanks to misinterpretation of the 14th Amendment, is now a federal bludgeon against the states.
Yes it does.
On this we agree! That's why Judge John E. Jones III deserves all the praise bestowed upon him for taking us decidedly in the right direction to keep agenda driven fanatics from subverting our childrens education!
This one is surely a candidate for "This is your brain on Creationism."
How many times do we have to repeat this until it sinks in? Science does not deal in proof. For that matter, "proof" is an unobtainable standard in the real word -- proofs are only possible in artificial realms like mathematics.
See also: Creationist Claim CA202: Evolution has not been, and cannot be, proved. .
But if you want overwhelming evidence of man's common ancestry with apes, along multiple cross-confirming lines, see for example this. Of course, you've already *seen* a lot of that evidence, when you were pinged to this post. You even posted a short reply to it. Why do you now pretend that you aren't aware of it?
Actually, a fair reading of the opinion indicates that is was in fact an activist opinion.
Sometimes activisism can acheive the "correct" results, but it is always wrong.
Any ruling which includes an attack on a legislative body for being "activist" has a real problem -- because legislation can be activist. That is where you WANT activism. We elect people to represent us, and to enact laws and regulations reflecting what we would like to see.
This judge injected himself into the political process to protect us (the unwashed masses) from electing people who enacted stupid regulations (stupid defined by the benevolent dictatorship of the judiciary).
I would note that the people of Dover rose up and voted out of office the representatives on the board who supported ID. ID was going down, through the normal legislative process, and the judge short-circuited that process and disenfranchised a minority of people by telling them that THEIR opinions have no place in law.
The constitution does not forbid bad law, and has no clause making it unconstitutional for a school to teach bad science.
When it comes right down to it, the judge just made this another "separation of church and state" ruling -- and the 4th circuit court of appeals just pointed out that there is no separation of church and state.
ID is not a religion, and teaching ID in science is NOT establishing a religion, forcing anybody to believe in a religion, or providing preferential treatment to a specific religion -- because ID is NOT a religion. Roman Catholocism is a religion, Mormanism is a religion, Islam is a religion.
ID at its worst could be described as a belief arising out of a religious viewpoint. "Thou shalt not Murder" is not religion either, but it has as firm religious foundation, just as some say ID does.
It is about time that the supreme court ends this activist judicial philosophy of denying the people the right to laws that have a moral or religious basis, in the false guise of preventing the "establishment of religion".
IT doesn't matter whether you think ID should be taught as science or not. The judge's ruling was an activist anti-religion ruling, and should be overturned (it won't be, because the people have spoken, and the new school board won't spend another dime on this).
The correct thing for the anti-ID folks to do would have been to launch an education campaign in Dover, to teach the citizens so they would rise up and vote out the offending board members. That's how democracy works. Using the courts to acheive legislative solutions is the definition of activism.
I agree with you, most people believe evolution is a fact because they have been taught that it is. Every person has a responsibility to investigate for themselves and come with their own answer and personally I don't see a problem with simply stating that evolution is a theory and not a fact before discussing it is science class, what is the fear? Also I am a creationist and there is a distinct difference whether evolutionist believe it or not.
Thanks for the ping!
Quite true. Creationism believes a God created everything. ID believes a God or a God like surrogate created everything.
No, a fair reading of the opinion indicates that the judge ruled by applying the controlling, precedential law (which he, as a district judge, is required to do) to the facts as presented at trial. That isn't activism, that's his job.
Is the Bill of Rights to stand in our Constitution hereafter, as in the past five years within eleven States, a mere dead letter? It is absolutely essential to the safety of the people that it should be enforced...'Mr. Speaker, it appears to me that this very provision of the bill of rights brought in question this day, upon this trial before the House, more than any other provision of the Constitution, makes that unity of government which constitutes us one people, by which and through which American nationality came to be, and only by the enforcement of which can American nationality continue to be...'What more could have been added to that instrument to secure the enforcement of these provisions of the bill of rights in every State, other than the additional grant of power which we ask this day?...Gentlemen who oppose this amendment oppose the grant of power to enforce the bill of rights.
There is no such thing as partial evolution. Either a species is evolving or it's not. If the species is evolving then, besides extinction, there is no cut off point that stops the process of replication, heritable difference, and natural selection from continuing.
Well, I have four kids; sorry to spoil your fantasy. I was merely following the Darwinian imperative to spam the environment with my genes.
This means, in evolutionary terms, that the Cult is as doomed as the dodo.
No, no, it's OK: Charles Darwin is continuing to fashion more evolutionists out of clay.
(Metaphorically, that is. Somewhere, a creationist scion is opening one of Mr. Darwin's books, and it's making sense to him. Unlike the origin of species, the propagation of wisdom does not depend on common descent.)
We didn't come from apes. And why do you bother replying to my posts?
No, but then that's not what the TOE says.
Well, that depends on how exactly one defines "apes".
If one means "any modern ape species", as creationists often mistakenly presume it does (as in when they mockingly say, "were you a chimp on your mother's side, or your father's side", etc.), then no, we did not descend from "apes".
If on the other hand one means, "a no longer extant species which would, under modern classifications, qualify as an 'ape' if it still lived today", then yes, the common ancestor of man and the other apes (we're *still* technically apes ourselves, actually) then yes, we descended from apes. The ape clade had already branched off from the monkey clade long before the first proto-human arose, although the "apes" at that time were quite different from the modern ones.
Or just a babbling fool!
And which one are you?
Your stubborn declarations notwithstanding, that is nonetheless what vast amounts of evidence clearly indicates. You can deal with that reality, or choose to cover your eyes and ignore it. Your choice.
And why do you bother replying to my posts?
Because a) I do not consider your education to be a lost cause quite yet, and b) your misinformation and misrepresentations still need to be corrected, lest any lurkers might make the mistake of presuming that you knew what you were talking about.
"Privileges and immunities" is a term with a long history in English law...used frequently in royal charters, grants, letters patents, etc. Basically, what is guaranteed was that, each state was bound to grant to citizens of other States traveling within its borders, the same civil rights which it granted to its own citizens. That is how it was used in several colonial state constitutions.
You'll note it appears in Article IV of the Constitution, an article that basically deals with matters of comity between the States like the "full faith and credit" clause
So, while the P&I clause of the 14th Amendment might be applicable if the town of Dover or the state of Pennsylvania had a law that prohibited citizens visting from other states from worshipping at a certain type of church open to Pennsylvania citizens...it has no application here
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