Posted on 05/14/2008 1:33:35 AM PDT by MartinaMisc
IN A SPEECH on the federal judiciary last week, John McCain sounded the familiar conservative call for judges who know their place. "My nominees," he promised, "will understand that there are clear limits to the scope of judicial power, and clear limits to the scope of federal power." The judiciary's moral authority depends on self-restraint, said McCain, and "this authority quickly vanishes when a court presumes to make law instead of apply it."
The senator emphasized the importance of judicial modesty and deference to the elected branches of government, lamenting that "federal judges today issue rulings and opinions on policy questions that should be decided democratically." He criticized Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton for not being concerned "when fundamental questions of social policy are preemptively decided by judges instead of by the people and their elected representatives."
But is it really the proper function of the courts to simply rubber-stamp laws passed by Congress and state legislatures? Is a law presumed constitutional merely because elected officials enacted it? "If my fellow citizens want to go to Hell," declared Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, a staunch advocate of judicial restraint, "I will help them. It's my job."
It was a clever remark - but a poor recipe for sustaining the Framers' system of checks and balances, or defending important liberty interests against political encroachment. Quite the contrary: Judicial deference to the political branches has led to some of the worst judicial decisions in American history.
(Excerpt) Read more at boston.com ...
Is Jacoby trying to get me to like McCain?
Jacoby really doesn’t know what he’s talking about.
Has Jeff Jacoby ever actually even seen a copy of the United States Constitution...?
Jacoby is usually much better than this - what a weak column. He does not grasp that the Roberts/Alito type of justice is not “passive” in letting legislative and executive misdeeds stand no matter what. The “dirty dozen” cases that are mentioned would have been decided correctly by justices like John Roberts, immersed deeply in the US Constitutions requirements and limits.
I’d like to ask McCain if he would nominate judges who would declare CFR and any gun-show “loophole” laws unconstitutional. (Notwithstanding the fact that those two abominations are McCain’s babies.)
I’d like to ask McCain if he would nominate judges who would declare CFR and any gun-show “loophole” laws unconstitutional. (Notwithstanding the fact that those two abominations are McCain’s babies.)
Given our choices in the next election, I'm not sure we actually want to know the answer to the issue, asked that way.There is actually, according to constitutional lawyer John Armor (our Congressman Billybob), presently sitting a 5-4 majority to overturn McCain-Feingold - always assuming that Roberts and Alito vote the way that Rhenquist did, and O'Connor didn't, vote on the issue in McConnell v. FEC. Basically, in its present configuration Justice Kennedy is the Supreme Court - he is essentially or actually never in the minority. And he was strongly against McCain-Feingold.
Presently Senator Reid is working mischief by preventing the existence of a quorum on the Federal Election commission, on the pretext that Bush's nominee is wrong on Voter ID - and continues to do so even though SCOTUS has, in the recent Indiana case, a ruled against Reid's theory. Reid's action has consequences in the here-and-now for the McCain campaign's finances, and I (not being a lawyer and not even playing one on TV) would argue that not only McCain himself (who obviously wouldn't do it) but any contributor to McCain's campaign has standing to bring the McConnell v. FEC case back to SCOTUS and demand relief from McCain-Feingold - and perhaps even from the older (Nixon era?) law that created the FEC in the first place.
I would love to see some of the argument of my recent vanity article, The Right to Know, turned into a brief against McCain-Feingold. Feingold ratifies journalism's conceit that journalists are superior beings, essentially above the law and the sovereignty of the country. And I think I make the fallacy clear in my article. Did you know that in 1945 SCOTUS actually ruled that the Associated Press was a monopoly in violation of the Sherman Antitrust Act? And that is in reality the organization most benefitted, at the expense of the rights of the people, by McCain-Feingold.
Can't wait to mail him a nice note in his prepaid envelope he provids me.
Will he nominate judges that will strike down mccain feingold CFR?
This is exactly the type of attack on McCain that I expected from MSM. Their argument is: The Court will be a rubberstamp. That is not true. It is quite simple. The Court should follow the laws in front of them. There are specific procedures to do so.
Has Jeff Jacoby ever actually even seen a copy of the United States Constitution...?
I’m sure he’s lifted a few lines from it claiming them as his own (The Globe suspended Jacoby for four months for the plagiarism 8-18-06)
He said NO LITMUS TESTS - including CFR.
I’m not talking about litmus tests, I’m just asking whether he would appoint those whose tendency to rule would incline them to overturn CFR, e.g. Scalia. (Did you read Scalia’s dissent on CFR? It was scathing, Scalia found it necessary to resort to sarcasm in the decision.)
Probably some yes, some no. McCain has said those who interpret the Constitution faithfully and are not activists. Look for a homerun from McCain on SCOTUS. The expectations are so ridiculously low.
More likely a foul ball to left field.
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