Posted on 03/15/2006 9:51:35 PM PST by NormsRevenge
BOSTON - Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia railed against the era of the "judge-moralist," saying judges are no better qualified than "Joe Sixpack" to decide moral questions such as abortion and gay marriage.
"Anyone who thinks the country's most prominent lawyers reflect the views of the people needs a reality check," he said during a speech to New England School of Law students and faculty at a Law Day banquet on Wednesday night.
The 70-year-old justice said the public, through elected legislatures — not the courts — should decide watershed questions such as the legality of abortion.
Scalia decried his own court's recent overturning of a state anti-sodomy law, joking that he personally believes "sexual orgies eliminate tension and ought to be encouraged," but said a panel of judges is not inherently qualified to determine the morality of such behavior.
He pointed to the granting of voting rights to women in 1920 through a constitutional amendment as the proper way for a democracy to fundamentally change its laws.
"Judicial hegemony" has replaced the public's right to decide important moral questions, he said. Instead, he said, politics has been injected in large doses to the process of nominating and confirming federal judges.
Scalia has made similar, if less strident, comments during past public appearances.
The jurist, well-known as a strict constructionist in his interpretation of the Constitution, opened his remarks by saying, "I brought three speeches, and I decided to give the most provocative one, because this seems to be too happy a crowd."
You can pull out the stats for overweight and then you've made a case for the legislature making rules and weighing things.
What in the world do you think the legislature is there for? They are the elected folks who decide how this nation gets run. It is majoritarian....some votes require simple majority and some require super majority of some form or other.
Equal protection says absolutely NOTHING about dangerous sex acts. Just that statement on your part opens up another question of OPINION.
The judges are not the ones who get to decide questions of opinion. That would enable them to be policy makers. They aren't and never were intended to be.
Churches can and should be able to do whatever they want, though if they want the benefits of incorporation (specifically, tax-exemption), then they have to live by the State's rules. Frankly, I think tax-exemption of churches should end. It certainly is not a moral imperitive; it is simply a carryover from the medieval independance of the Catholic Church and from the English state-church days.
You don't believe there is a slippery slope? You obviously haven't lived long enough to watch it happen. xzins and I have.
I take no position as to whether or not there is a slippery slope. It is, however, a logical fallacy and an invalid argument.
As it was in the days of Noah..... Figure it out.
I know the quote, but I have no patience for veiled Biblical quotations.
And some things - for instance a bill of attainder - cannot be done, even if 299,999,999 of the 300 million Americans want them. These things are beyond the reach of the majoritarian process.
Insurance companies routinely discriminate against smokers and overweight people. Some insurance comapanies will not write people in either of those categories. But if they tried to exclude homosexuals based upon their behavior, then they would lose their licenses to sell insurance.
So what is happening is that "normal" people and those who are overweight and smoke (who generally live 10 to 15 years longer than the average practicing male homosexual) are subsidising to a great extent the homosexuals who have a protected status that keeps insurance companies from utilizing the statisical actuarial information which would likely make these people uninsurable.
So xzins and I are subsidizing the abberant and dangerous behavior of homosexual men because your constitutional interpretation would prevent the reality of and the impact upon society of their aberant behavioral activities. All in the name of "equal protection".
These people are not entitled to equal protection because of their behavior. If we applied the equal protection clause as you want to do so, then insurance companies would not be allowed to take into consideration any private conduct by anyone when writing policies. Eventually there would be no insurance companies, since their livelihoods depend upon charging people appropriately based upon ACTUAL risk.
"The power to tax is the power to destroy." John Marshall.
I thought he was your hero.
Actually, a bill of attainder can be done. It requires the constitutional process of changing the constitution to accomodate bills of attainder.
It is not beyond the reach.
Churches are not taxed because the constitution has the first amendment that prevents establishment of religion and anything that inhibits free exercise.
Taking my offering plate money given to God is inhibiting my free exercise. I worshipped God with $100 last week. To take any of it is to take away some of my right to freely worship my God.
And medieval churches weren't taxed for the same reason that the government isn't taxed today. They were an ESTABLISHED part of the government. They were part of the group doing the taxing.
That would be part of the thought behind "The Holy Roman Empire."
The Framers of the Constitution looked at all the pre-existing the state constitutions, when they were drafting the US Constitution. Exactly one had a "supra-legislature." It was called the Council of Revision, and it had the power to reject laws that had been duly passed by the legislature. (Judges were part, but not all, of the membership of that Council.)
The Framers deliberately rejected the idea that any equivalent of the Council of Revision should be part of the US Constitution. Yet in our day, the Court has become exactly such a creature, in the grip of Justices who do not obey their oath of office to respect and defend the Constitution.
First indications from the new Roberts Court, with John Roberts as Chief Justice and Justice Alito replacing Justice O'Connor, are very favorable. It looks like the Court is moving away from that false role it had previously assumed. This is right in line with what Scalia is talking about.
Congressman Billybob
Latest column: "Daniel in the Lion's Den -- A Red Candidate in a Blue Meeting"
That was only in Lawerence v. Texas. I was referring to Romer v. Evans.
It's called humor.
Another Roe v. Wade style judicial abortion of the legislative process!
Justice Scalia , with whom The Chief Justice and
In holding that homosexuality cannot be singled out for disfavorable treatment, the Court contradicts a decision, unchallenged here, pronounced only 10 years ago, see Bowers v. Hardwick, 478 U.S. 186 (1986), and places the prestige of this institution behind the proposition that opposition to homosexuality is as reprehensible as racial or religious bias. Whether it is or not is precisely the cultural debate that gave rise to the Colorado constitutional amendment (and to the preferential laws against which the amendment was directed). Since the Constitution of the United States says nothing about this subject, it is left to be resolved by normal democratic means, including the democratic adoption of provisions in state constitutions. This Court has no business imposing upon all Americans the resolution favored by the elite class from which the Members of this institution are selected, pronouncing that "animosity" toward homosexuality, ante, at 13, is evil. I vigorously dissent.
I think you fail to recognize that I don't tend to agree with Scalia's dissents. They tend to be fun to read - in stark contrast to most Supreme Court cases - but I disagree with his legal reasoning.
I know you disagree. That's sad. I had high hopes for you when you entered into law school.
But I know and understand the liberal legal brainwashing that is endemic within the walls of todays law schools. You probably don't realize how it has affected you because you are on the inside of the fish bowl. But I have seen it.
I must say that I had the advantage of being 32 years old when I entered into law school. I had the advantage of having some real world experience, in life and in owning and operating my own business and in working with my hands and working full time while going to law school being the sole provider for a family of 5.
I think it is a little tougher to brainwash a person who has chosen law as a second career. I was young and stupid once too. In my college days I was a confirmed socialist. That was due mainly to my lack of real world experience while I was living in a college envioronment. College is not the real world. It is so far removed from the real world that the real world is not recognizable when you really enter into it.
Stupid judicial decisions like Lawrence and Romer and Roe v. Wade have undermined rather than contributed to our constitutional republic. They have also undermined the Judiciary branch as well by politicizing the judical branch. Why do you think it is almost impossible to get a supreme court nominee through the process? It is because it is no longer viewed as a judicial appointment where the only qualification is an open mind and a judicial temperment, but it is now a political appointment where each side must ensure that the judge is predisposed to their political persuasion.
Scalia recognizes the fact that these decisions are dangerous to our republic. Scalia recognizes that once the Supreme Court is viewed as a political arm of one party or the other, that it will no longer be independent. Go ahead and disagree with Scalia. But hopefully someday you will learn to think like him.
Xzins:
What in the world do you think the legislature is there for? They are the elected folks who decide how this nation gets run. It is majoritarian....some votes require simple majority and some require super majority of some form or other.
Actually, a bill of attainder can be done. It requires the constitutional process of changing the constitution to accomodate bills of attainder.
It is not beyond the reach.
Not true. -- We cannot 'amend away' our basic inalienable rights without voiding the constitutional contract.
-- 'Laws' passed that are repugnant to constitutional principles are null & void.
Billybob:
Homosexuality WAS illegal. The Supreme Court decided to legalize it. Scalia is exactly right.
There is no legal basis left to deny the other sexual activities involving adults, based on the Court's decision in the Texas sodomy case.
'Sins' like prostitution, polygamy & homosexuality can not be made federal crimes, nor can they be 'legalized'.
-- Public aspects of all three however, can be regulated by State & local authorities using due process within Constitutional bounds.
The Court's decision in the Texas sodomy case changed nothing in that regard. -- It simply enforced the 14th in the Laurence case.
However, the Supreme Court CAN "legalize" anything they want, simply by finding that there is a new "right" under the Constitution which protects such activity. Perhaps you've heard of Roe v. Wade? It was in all the papers.
When the Court gets loose from the Constitution and starts inventing "rights" that are not there, they can legalize anything that five Justices want to, in their Friday afternoon conferences where they decide the cases argued that week.
The only thing preventing the Texas sodomy case from being extended to groups of consenting adults, plus the occasional barnyard animal, except the replacement of Justice O'Connor by Justice Alito. We need at least two more Justices appointed to fill coming vacancies, to assure that the Court will stop inventing "rights."
That is Justice Scalia's point. And if you do not understand that, you need to read his Dissent in the Texas sodomy case. He lays it out chapter and verse.
Congressman Billybob
Latest article: "Rep. Taylor's Office Caught in an Obvious Lie in Attempt to Smear John Armor"
I'm not talking about a law being passed.
I'm talking about the constitution itself being amended.
bttt
Actually, a bill of attainder can be done. It requires the constitutional process of changing the constitution to accomodate bills of attainder.
It is not beyond the reach.
Not true. -- We cannot 'amend away' our basic inalienable rights without voiding the constitutional contract.
-- 'Laws' passed that are repugnant to constitutional principles are null & void.
I'm not talking about a law being passed. I'm talking about the constitution itself being amended.
So am I: -- We cannot 'amend away' our basic inalienable rights..
Do you really contend that we could repeal the 2nd Amendment, - for instance?
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