LOL.....Yes! I've finally achieved homeboy status. Maybe someday I can be as (ahem) "cool" as the Icy Hot Stuntaz. Bling, bling!
Posted on 04/11/2003 5:07:27 PM PDT by bourbon
04/10/2003
UNIVERSITY, Miss. - U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia told a standing-room-only crowd at the University of Mississippi Thursday afternoon to beware of the concept of the Constitution as a "living document."
Scalia, 67, a conservative justice known for legal decisions based on strict interpretations of the U.S. Constitution, said people who want change in society should use the democratic process, not the courts, to bring it about.
"What makes you think that a living Constitution is going to evolve in the direction of greater freedoms?" Scalia asked. "It could evolve in the direction of less freedom, and it has."
The controversial jurist drew more than 900 students, faculty, staff and others to Fulton Chapel for the James McClure Memorial Lecture in Law. The event was free and open to the public.
Scalia, a Reagan appointee who has served on the nation's highest court since 1986, has angered both liberals and conservatives at times with his opinions. In 1989, he cast the deciding fifth vote in Texas v. Johnson, the decision that struck down laws against burning the American flag. At the time, conservatives were incensed. Thursday afternoon, Scalia told the UM crowd in that case and others, he was handcuffed by the Constitution.
"I would have been delighted to throw Mr. (Gregory Lee) Johnson in jail," Scalia said of the man tied to the flag case. "Unfortunately, as I understand the First Amendment, I couldn't do it."
While Scalia's strict interpretation protects those rights expressly written by the framers in 1791, he said he doesn't recognize rights that many people today take for granted as constitutional. For instance, Scalia, a devout Catholic and father of nine, has vigorously opposed abortion on the grounds that it's not a right guaranteed specifically, even though other justices interpret it otherwise.
But this kind of interpretation, Scalia said, goes far beyond their role as jurists and turns justices into policy makers, which in turn pollutes the selection process.
Scalia referenced the embattled Bush nominations to the U.S. Court of Appeals.
"People have finally figured out ... that judges aren't interpreting law anymore, they're making policy," Scalia said. "So I don't want a good lawyer, I want someone who agrees with me.
"We'll have to have a mini-constitutional convention every time they select a new justice of the Supreme Court."
Outside Fulton Chapel, about 15 students from the campus chapters of the National Organization for Women and the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Association staged a quiet protest.
"There are several important cases in front of the court right now," said Amy Clukey, president of UM's NOW and a senior from Deltona, Fla. "Sodomy laws, affirmative action at the University of Michigan, and of course, abortion rights are always an issue."
Chris Kelly from Sherman carried a sign that read: "Sodomy Laws are against basic human freedoms."
"I wanted to take the opportunity to speak up for those who are unwilling or unable to speak up for themselves," Kelly said.
Inside the auditorium, Scalia drew fire from the other side of the political spectrum when he opened the floor to questions. Jim Giles of Richland, a private citizen and outspoken proponent of conservative causes, had driven to campus for the speech. He told Scalia that the university's ban of flags on sticks in Vaught-Hemingway Stadium was just a "pretext to ban the Confederate flag. How isn't that unconstitutional?"
Scalia paused, then answered slowly, with a wave of his hand. "I have no idea."
The crowd laughed and applauded. The Supreme Court has upheld the university's right on the ban.
After the speech, second-year law students Brett McColl of Toledo, Ohio, Joey Long of Henderson, N.C., and David Ford of Memphis said Scalia argued so convincingly for strict constitutional interpretation that they wished another legal scholar had been available to present a counter-point.
"I generally disagree with just about everything the man writes, but he's definitely intelligent and knows the law," McColl said.
According to Scalia, knowing the law and how to apply it is his only job.
"People who want to read one new law into the Constitution after another, from abortion rights to grandparents' rights, are not looking for a flexible government," he said. "They're looking for rigidity."
It was Scalia's third appearance in the McClure Lecture Series and the sixth time a U.S. Supreme Court justice has presented the lecture. Henry Blackmun delivered it in 1982, Sandra Day O'Connor in 1988 and Clarence Thomas in 1995.
The series was established by James McClure Jr. of Sardis and Tupper McClure Lampton of Columbia in honor of their father, a Sardis attorney and UM law school alumnus.
by Angela Moore
...Thos. Jefferson
Three branches of government with checks and balances. A constitutional republic if we can keep it. It's all the rage, open a book.
Until it's amended properly, it most certainly is. Where do you get the idea that it's meaning can be made to change over time? That defeats the purpose of having a written constitution.
Actually, yes, but the Constitution was amended to remedy those race issues -- Read 13th and 14th Amendments.
The Constitution should be open to new, more progressive interpretations, rather than sticking with one neanderthal view, IMHO.
Well, either words mean things or they don't.
If the Constitution is to be regarded as whatever 5 of 9 justices feel that day, then NO ONES rights are assured.
On the other hand, if we interpret a document based upon a fair reading of its original meaning, then our rights aren't subject to the latest PC fads.
Hey, the Framers put in a process to change the Constitution. I'd rather the Constitution be changed by Constituinal convention than by the whims of Judicial fiat.
By the way, a "neanderthal view" is one where our individual rights are subject to the whims of judges, rather than the rule of law.
Yes, there are some who would twist the plain language of the Constitution until it howls in agony.
In the last election, New Jersey was suprised when 47 days didn't mean 47 days after "the Torch" bailed. In 2000, I was fascinated to learn that deadlines clearly set forth by Florida Legislators could be reconstrued to mean whatever the Florida Supreme Court said. I was further fascinated to learn that the deadlines that the Florida Supreme Court made up were equally meaningless if the Florida Supreme Court so decided later.
Fortunately, the U.S. Supreme Court taught the Florida Supreme Court about Article II and the 14th Amendment. since then Democrats have howled about the "evil Supreme Court appointing Bush" over something as trivial as the Equal Protection clause of the Constitution.
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