Posted on 03/25/2008 9:43:10 AM PDT by indcons
This is very good news. Congrats to the state of Texas, which had to fight the open-borders lobby and the Bush administration all the way to the high court to prevent international law from superseding American sovereignty:
President Bush overstepped his authority when he ordered a Texas court to grant a new hearing to a Mexican on death row for rape and murder, the Supreme Court said Tuesday.
In a case that mixes presidential power, international relations and the death penalty, the court sided with Texas 6-3.
Bush was in the unusual position of siding with death row prisoner Jose Ernesto Medellin, a Mexican citizen whom police prevented from consulting with Mexican diplomats, as provided by international treaty.
An international court ruled in 2004 that the convictions of Medellin and 50 other Mexicans on death row around the United States violated the 1963 Vienna Convention, which provides that people arrested abroad should have access to their home country’s consular officials. The International Court of Justice, also known as the world court, said the Mexican prisoners should have new court hearings to determine whether the violation affected their cases.
Bush, who oversaw 152 executions as Texas governor, disagreed with the decision. But he said it must be carried out by state courts because the United States had agreed to abide by the world court’s rulings in such cases. The administration argued that the president’s declaration is reason enough for Texas to grant Medellin a new hearing.
Chief Justice John Roberts, writing for the majority, disagreed. Roberts said the international court decision cannot be forced upon the states.
The president may not “establish binding rules of decision that pre-empt contrary state law,” Roberts said.
Andy McCarthy summed up the bottom line on this case last fall:
At bottom, the case is about the freedom of Texans to govern themselves, to put sadistic murderers to death if that is what they choose democratically to do, as long as they adhere to American constitutional procedures in carrying out that policy choice. Sure, it offends Mexicans, Europeans, international law professors, and a motley collection of jurists who see themselves as a supra-sovereign tribunal. But that is not a basis for the President to interfere.
The administration has made a great show of promoting democracy. Democracy, however, begins at home.
Don’t you forget it.
***
SCOTUSblog’s Lyle Deniston has more:
The Supreme Court, in a sweeping rejection of claims of power in the presidency, ruled 6-3 on Tuesday that the President does not have the authority to order states to relax their criminal procedures to obey a ruling of the World Court. The decision came in the case of Medellin v. Texas (06-984). Neither a World Court decision requiring U.S. states to provide new review of criminal cases involving foreign nationals, nor a memo by President Bush seeking to enforce the World Court ruling, preempts state law restrictions on challenges to convictions, the Court said in a ruling written by Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr.
The decision, aside from its rebuff of presidential power, also treats the World Court ruling itself as not binding on U.S. states, when it contradicts those states’ criminal procedure rules. The international treaty at issue in this dispute — the Vienna Convention that gives foreign nationals accused of crime a right to meet with diplomats from their home country — is not enforceable as a matter of U.S. law, the Roberts opinion said. And the World Court ruling seeking to implement that treaty inside the U.S. is also not binding, and does not gain added legal effect merely because the President sought to tell the states to abide by the decision, the Court added.
The ruling also is a defeat for 51 Mexican nationals who won a World Court decision in 2004, finding that U.S. states had denied them their consular access rights and advising the U.S. government to take steps to enforce the ruling. In the specific case, Mexican national Jose Ernesto Medellin, sought to rely on both the World Court decision and the Bush memo to reopen his case, claiming that he was never given access to any Mexican diplomat while his case was going through Texas state courts.
The Bush Administration did not agree with the World Court ruling, and, in fact, withdrew from the international protocol that gave the World Court the authority to enforce the Vienna Convention. Even so, Bush issued a memo in February 2005, agreeing that the U.S. would seek to obey the World Court, and he told the states involve to “give effect” to that tribunal’s decision. The case thus came to the Court as a major test of presidential authority, in seeking to enforce treaty obligations, to override contradictory state criminal procedure rules. In that test, the presidency clearly lost.
The opinion will be posted here. Transcript of the oral arguments from last fall is here.
Of course, since the world "court" is not an Art III court, as its "judges" are neither appointed by the President nor confirmed by the Senate, it cannot issue any rulings which any US citizen is bound to respect.
So? The whole Senate voted for Ginsberg. Comparative analysis.
And then there's the whole knife-in-the-back Gang of 14 affair that you so conveniently glossed over.
“A gain, albeit a small one.”
Currently, my standards are such that anything that remotely resembles a gain at this point is cause for celebration.
EODGUY
comparative analysis.
I’d imagine this spoiled Jorge’s plans for the next Cinco de Mayo.
Looks good on him.
Applause and bows! FINALLY, someone gets it right!
...which means precisely squat when our side is running a socialist.
OK, you say that Bush intervened because he had to uphold the Vienna Convention. But according to the article, Bush "said it must be carried out by state courts because the United States had agreed to abide by the world court’s rulings in such cases. The administration argued that the president’s declaration is reason enough for Texas to grant Medellin a new hearing. Also, "Chief Justice John Roberts, writing for the majority, disagreed. Roberts said the international court decision cannot be forced upon the states."
Seems like either the article is incorrect, or you are twisting Bush's justification for intervening in Medellin case.
>>However, the U.S. never ratified the treaty that created the “world court. President Clinton did sign the treaty, but the senate never ratified. President Bush was free to withdraw the U.S. as a signatory to the “world court,” and he did so in 2002.<<
Good point.
A great decision by our great Chief Justice John G Roberts. And look who provided vote #6 in favor: John Paul Stevens!
Have you bothered to read the opinion yet? (If so, I'd guess that you are in a very small minority on this thread, but based on your comment, I'd guess 'no')
PDF here:
http://www.supremecourtus.gov/opinions/07pdf/06-984.pdf
"In sum, while the ICJ’s judgment in Avena creates an international law obligation on the part of the United States, it does not of its own force constitute binding federal law that pre-empts state restrictions on the filing of successive habeas petitions. As we noted in Sanchez- Llamas, a contrary conclusion would be extraordinary,given that basic rights guaranteed by our own Constitution do not have the effect of displacing state procedural rules. See 548 U. S., at 360. "
(slip opinion at 27)
Chief Justice John Roberts, writing for the majority, disagreed. Roberts said the international court decision cannot be forced upon the states.
The president may not “establish binding rules of decision that pre-empt contrary state law,” Roberts said.
BUMP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
So the next clinton president simply reinstates thje protocals for enforcement and then we are back to square one...
You are very right! The article said more than once President Bush DID NOT like the ruling of the World Court.
By Bush encouraging this to go all the way to the supreme court sets it firmly, 1. The president CAN NOT over rule the laws of the state. 2.The World Court can not over rule a states law.
A Liberal democrat president will not be able to make it’s own ruling over the states.
This is GREAT NEWS!
This has been discussed and after relfection the SC set a precedent that may help Presidents avoid pitfalls in the future.
Presidents have the right to sign international treaties, they need to be ratified by Congress. But I think few would disagree that foreignors arrested in foreign lands should have the right to confer with their embassies.
What strikes me is how so many on these threads have turned this into a high five fest because they think they scored one against illegal aliens from Mexico. The question goes far beyond and is far more serious than getting a good slap in on a few illegals.
HA! Now that I read down the page a little I find you stated it very very well. Sometimes people only read the first few sentences and miss the most important info.
Great post!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.