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To: Frantzie; All

How about this? barry signed the SCHIP bill the other day, which includes a tobacco tax increase. The position would be, the new law (in particular the tax increase) is void because the man who signed it is not eligible to be POTUS. It seems to me that anyone who pays the tax would have standing. Any lawyers out there with an opinion on this?


9 posted on 02/09/2009 4:54:05 PM PST by shooter223 (the government should fear the citizens......not the other way around)
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To: shooter223
How about this? barry signed the SCHIP bill the other day, which includes a tobacco tax increase. The position would be, the new law (in particular the tax increase) is void because the man who signed it is not eligible to be POTUS. It seems to me that anyone who pays the tax would have standing. Any lawyers out there with an opinion on this?

That is at least plausible on its face-- the suit that is the subject of this article, in contrast, is a joke and will certainly be dismissed.

The challenge to the tobacco tax does get over the standing hurdle, but may face other obstacles. (Google "enrolled bill doctrine").

12 posted on 02/09/2009 5:30:11 PM PST by Lurking Libertarian (Non sub homine, sed sub Deo et lege)
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To: shooter223
Here is the information I have compiled on standing, if you would like to form your own opinion:

A person cannot bring a suit challenging the constitutionality of a law unless the plaintiff can demonstrate that the plaintiff is (or will be) harmed by the law. Otherwise, the court will rule that the plaintiff "lacks standing" to bring the suit, and will dismiss the case without considering the merits of the claim of unconstitutionality. In order to sue to have a court declare a law unconstitutional, there must be a valid reason for whoever is suing to be there. The party suing must have something to lose in order to sue unless they have automatic standing by action of law.

In United States law, the Supreme Court of the United States has stated, "In essence the question of standing is whether the litigant is entitled to have the court decide the merits of the dispute or of particular issues".

There are a number of requirements that a plaintiff must establish in order to have standing before a federal court. Some are based on the case or controversy requirement of the judicial power of Article Three of the United States Constitution, § 2, cl.1. As stated there, "The Judicial Power shall extend to all Cases . . .[and] to Controversies . . ." The requirement that a plaintiff have standing to sue is a limit on the role of the judiciary and the law of Article III standing is built on the idea of separation of powers. Federal courts may exercise power only "in the last resort, and as a necessity".

There are three constitutional standing requirements:

1. Injury: The plaintiff must have suffered or imminently will suffer injury - an invasion of a legally protected interest which is concrete and particularized. The injury must be actual or imminent, distinct and palpable, not abstract. This injury could be economic as well as non-economic.

2. Causation: There must be a causal connection between the injury and the conduct complained of, so that the injury is fairly traceable to the challenged action of the defendant and not the result of the independent action of some third party who is not before the court.

3. Redressability: It must be likely, as opposed to merely speculative, that a favorable court decision will redress the injury.

Additionally, there are three major prudential (judicially-created) standing principles. Congress can override these principles via statute, but Congress cannot change the three constitutional standing requirements.

1. Prohibition of Third Party Standing: A party may only assert his or her own rights and cannot raise the claims of a third party who is not before the court; exceptions exist where the third party has interchangeable economic interests with the injured party, or a person unprotected by a particular law sues to challenge the oversweeping of the law into the rights of others, for example, a party suing that a law prohibiting certain types of visual material may sue because the 1st Amendment rights of others engaged in similar displays might also be damaged as well as those suing. Additionally, third parties who don't have standing may be able to sue under the next-friend doctrine if the third party is an infant, mentally handicapped, or not a party to a contract.

2. Prohibition of Generalized Grievances: A plaintiff cannot sue if the injury is widely shared in an undifferentiated way with many people. For example, the general rule is that there is no federal taxpayer standing, as complaints about the spending of federal funds are too remote from the process of acquiring them. Such grievances are ordinarily more appropriately addressed in the representative branches.

3. Zone of Interest Test: There are in fact two tests used by the United States Supreme Court for the Zone of Interest : (a) Zone of Injury - The injury is the kind of injury that Congress expected might be addressed under the statute; and (b) Zone of Interests - The party is within the zone of interest protected by the statute or constitutional provision.


28 posted on 02/10/2009 12:12:57 PM PST by JustaDumbBlonde (America: Home of the Free Because of the Brave)
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