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Ginsburg: Rulings in other countries are relevant here ( referred to the findings of foreign courts)
ap ^
| Monday, August 4, 2003
| ap
Posted on 08/06/2003 1:34:41 PM PDT by comnet
Ginsburg: Rulings in other countries are relevant here
U.S. Supreme Court
The U.S. Supreme Court is looking beyond America's borders for guidance in handling cases on issues like the death penalty and gay rights, according to Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
The justices referred to the findings of foreign courts this summer in their ruling that states may not punish gay couples for having sex. And in 2002, the court said that executing mentally retarded people is unconstitutionally cruel. That ruling noted that the practice was opposed internationally.
"Our island or lone ranger mentality is beginning to change," Ginsburg said Saturday during a speech to the American Constitution Society, a liberal lawyers group holding its first convention.
Justices "are becoming more open to comparative and international law perspectives," said Ginsburg, who has supported a more global view of judicial decision making. She cited an international treaty in her vote in June to uphold the use of race in college admissions.
The shift has angered some conservatives. Justice Antonin Scalia, in the gay sex case, wrote with two colleagues that the court should not "impose foreign moods, fads or fashions on Americans."
Ginsburg said the Internet is making decisions of courts in other countries more readily available in America, and they should not be ignored. "While you are the American Constitution Society, your perspective on constitutional law should encompass the world," she told the group of judges, lawyers and students. "We are the losers if we do not both share our experiences with and learn from others."
Monday, August 4, 2003
TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Foreign Affairs; Front Page News; Government; Miscellaneous; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: constitution; deathpenalty; globalism; homosexualagenda; impeachscotus; lawrencevtexas; ruthbaderginsburg; scotus; transjudicialism; ussupremecourt
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1
posted on
08/06/2003 1:34:57 PM PDT
by
comnet
To: comnet
I M P E A C H
2
posted on
08/06/2003 1:35:17 PM PDT
by
Frank_Discussion
(May the wings of Liberty never lose a feather!)
To: comnet
international law
3
posted on
08/06/2003 1:35:38 PM PDT
by
comnet
To: comnet
I M P E A C H
4
posted on
08/06/2003 1:36:46 PM PDT
by
Tank-FL
(Keep the Faith - GO VMI)
To: comnet
I agree. Impeach. See www.twistedsix.com
5
posted on
08/06/2003 1:36:54 PM PDT
by
diamond6
("Everyone who is for abortion HAS been born." Ronald Reagan)
To: Frank_Discussion
will the U.S people wakeup?
6
posted on
08/06/2003 1:37:01 PM PDT
by
comnet
To: comnet
This is against the Constitution, it is now time for an
amended set of laws to be set as referendums from the voters
to the legislature on changing the rules on throwing the
justices out of office.
Ops4 God Bless America!
7
posted on
08/06/2003 1:37:24 PM PDT
by
OPS4
To: Frank_Discussion
I M P E A C H
8
posted on
08/06/2003 1:37:33 PM PDT
by
Tank-FL
(Keep the Faith - GO VMI)
To: comnet
;-<
I sure as hell hope so.
9
posted on
08/06/2003 1:38:55 PM PDT
by
Frank_Discussion
(May the wings of Liberty never lose a feather!)
To: Frank_Discussion
10
posted on
08/06/2003 1:40:11 PM PDT
by
comnet
To: comnet
I M P E A C H ! ! ! !If this isn't grounds to impeach someone who takes a vow to uphold the U.S. Constitution I don't know what is.
11
posted on
08/06/2003 1:41:25 PM PDT
by
keithtoo
(Tax Cuts - A robber who doesn't steal from you isn't GIVING you a VCR!!)
To: comnet
IMPEACHMENT BUMP
12
posted on
08/06/2003 1:43:13 PM PDT
by
alancarp
(SItting Senators ought not cash in while under the public trust)
To: comnet
Justices "are becoming more open to comparative and international law perspectives," said Ginsburg, So... Written law and the ratified Constitution are to be modified by the whims of other countries.
The rule of law, and the rule by a soverign american people is dead.
13
posted on
08/06/2003 1:43:47 PM PDT
by
narby
(Terminate Gray Davis)
To: comnet
"becoming more open to comparative and international law perspectives...."
Pubbie Sen. Airhead Spector started this with his incorporation of Scotish Law during the Impeachment Trials....
14
posted on
08/06/2003 1:45:34 PM PDT
by
TRY ONE
(")
To: comnet
Justice Scalia, Justice Ginsberg what is the difference who appoints the next Supreme Court justice. (Not being serious.)
To: comnet
I think Ruth is on to something. Maybe we should make our women wear veils, cut off the hands of theifs, etc. Really what Ginsburg is looking for is a way to rationalize her twisted logic to strike down laws or even write laws consistant with her perverted beliefs which include legalizing pedophilia.
To: Frank_Discussion
I M P E A C H
As to learning from others, they could learn a lot from us.
17
posted on
08/06/2003 1:48:44 PM PDT
by
Drango
(A liberal's compassion is limited only by the size of someone else's wallet.)
To: narby
Justice: Can Constitution
make it in global age?
On TV, Breyer wonders whether it will 'fit into governing documents of other nations'
Posted: July 7, 2003
1:00 a.m. Eastern
© 2003 WorldNetDaily.com
In a rare appearance on a television news show, Supreme Court Justice Stephen G. Breyer questioned whether the U.S. Constitution, the oldest governing document in use in the world today, will continue to be relevant in an age of globalism.
Speaking with ABC News' "This Week" host George Stephanopoulos and his colleague Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, Breyer took issue with Justice Antonin Scalia, who, in a dissent in last month's Texas sodomy ruling, contended the views of foreign jurists are irrelevant under the U.S. Constitution.
Breyer had held that a ruling by the European Court of Human Rights that homosexuals had a fundamental right to privacy in their sexual behavior showed that the Supreme Court's earlier decision to the contrary was unfounded in the Western tradition.
"We see all the time, Justice O'Connor and I, and the others, how the world really it's trite but it's true is growing together," Breyer said. "Through commerce, through globalization, through the spread of democratic institutions, through immigration to America, it's becoming more and more one world of many different kinds of people. And how they're going to live together across the world will be the challenge, and whether our Constitution and how it fits into the governing documents of other nations, I think will be a challenge for the next generations."
In the Lawrence v Texas case decided June 26, Justice Anthony Kennedy gave as a reason for overturning a Supreme Court ruling of 17 years earlier upholding sodomy laws that it was devoid of any reliance on the views of a "wider civilization."
Scalia answered in his dissent: "The court's discussion of these foreign views (ignoring, of course, the many countries that have retained criminal prohibitions on sodomy) is ... meaningless dicta. Dangerous dicta, however, since this court ... should not impose foreign moods, fads, or fashions on Americans," he said quoting the 2002 Foster v. Florida case.
Scalia's scathing critique of the 6-3 sodomy ruling was unusual in its bluntness.
"Today's opinion is the product of a court, which is the product of a law-profession culture, that has largely signed on to the so-called homosexual agenda, by which I mean the agenda promoted by some homosexual activists directed at eliminating the moral opprobrium that has traditionally attached to homosexual conduct," he wrote. Later he concluded: "This court has taken sides in the culture war."
Both O'Connor and Breyer sought to downplay antipathy between the justices no matter how contentious matters before the court become. O'Connor said justices don't take harsh criticisms personally.
"When you work in a small group of that size, you have to get along, and so you're not going to let some harsh language, some dissenting opinion, affect a personal relationship," she said. "You can't do that."
Breyer agreed.
"So if I'm really put out by something, I can go to the person who wrote it and say, 'Look, I think you've gone too far here.'"
O'Connor, too, seemed to suggest in the ABC interview that the Constitution was far from the final word in governing America. Asked if there might come a day when it would no longer be the last word on the law, she said: "Well, you always have the power of entering into treaties with other nations which also become part of the law of the land, but I can't see the day when we won't have a constitution in our nation."
Asked to explain what he meant when he said judges who favor a very strict literal interpretation of the Constitution can't justify their practices by claiming that's what the framers wanted, Breyer responded: "I meant that the extent to which the Constitution is flexible is a function of what provisions you're talking about. When you look at the word 'two' for two representatives from every state in the United States Senate, two means two. But when you look like a word look at a word like 'interstate commerce,' which they didn't have automobiles in mind, or they didn't have airplanes in mind, or telephones, or the Internet, or you look at a word like 'liberty,' and they didn't have in mind at that time the problems of privacy brought about, for example, by the Internet and computers. You realize that the framers intended those words to maintain constant values, but values that would change in their application as society changed."
In an unrelated matter, O'Connor indicated on "This Week" that she would likely serve out the next term on the court, dismssing speculation that she was about to retire.
The current court is split between Chief Justice William Rehnquist, Clarence Thomas and Scalia, who tend to hold the traditional constitutionalist approach to rulings, and the majority of O'Connor, Breyer, Kennedy, Ruth Bader Ginzburg, David H. Souter and John Paul Stevens, who tend to believe in the concept of a "living Constitution" subject to changes in public opinion and interpretation.
18
posted on
08/06/2003 1:52:03 PM PDT
by
comnet
To: comnet
"America is at that awkward stage. It's too late to work within the system,
but too early to shoot the bastards."
- Claire Wolfe, 101 Things to Do 'Til the Revolution
Hey, Claire, wake up!
To: afuturegovernor
Jim Rogan, he's tanned, rested and ready.
Impeach the witch.
20
posted on
08/06/2003 1:54:47 PM PDT
by
ElkGroveDan
(Fighting for Freedom and Having Fun)
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