Posted on 08/14/2003 2:39:09 AM PDT by kattracks
(CNSNews.com) - Congress is now involved in the battle over the display of a Ten Commandments monument at the Alabama Supreme Court building. Indiana Republican Rep. John Hostettler's amendment to a House-passed appropriations bill would cut federal funds used to enforce a federal court order to remove the monument. The Senate has yet to pass its version of the appropriations bill.
The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on July 1 upheld a lower court ruling and ordered Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore to remove the 5,280-pound sculpture from the building's rotunda by Aug. 20. Moore had ordered the monument erected in the first place.
Hostettler is hoping his amendment to the Commerce, Justice, State and the Judiciary appropriations bill, which the House passed 260-161 on July 23, will prevent the monument from being moved. Hostettler, in a release, noted that the U.S. Marshals Service executes and enforces all lawful orders of U.S. district courts, and as a component of the Justice Department, is funded by the appropriations bill he amended.
"In Glassroth v. Moore, the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the Constitution by placing a granite monument of the Ten Commandments in the rotunda of the Alabama State judicial building in Montgomery, Ala.," Hostettler said on the House floor July 22.
"As Hamilton pointed out (in Federalist 78), the legislative branch controls the purse-strings of this government. When the legislative branch believes the judicial branch to be in error, the Congress may refuse to fund actions to enforce the court's judgment by the executive branch agency that would execute those judgments," Hostettler added.
The circuit court order, which was the subject of CNSNews.com reports on Aug. 6 and Aug. 7, has many other critics besides Hostettler.
"It's just madness," Walter Berns, resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, told CNSNews.com, emphasizing however that while he disagreed with the court decision on removing the sculpture, he did not favor the appropriations process as the proper means to block the removal.
"Maybe the Senate will put an end to it," Berns added.
Rob Boston, assistant director of communications for Americans United for Separation of Church and State, said Hostettler's efforts show disrespect for the Constitution.
"Whether members of Congress like it or not, they must accept the fact that they do not have the power to overturn judicial rulings through legislation, and that's really what this is an attempt to do," Boston told CNSNews.com.
Yet Alan Keyes, a former Republican presidential candidate in 2000 who will be attending a rally in Montgomery, Ala., Saturday opposing the sculpture's removal, saw no problem with the legislation.
"I think that's one step that would certainly be useful," Keyes told CNSNews.com. "I think that what we're dealing with here is a clear abuse of judicial power to destroy one of the most fundamental rights of our citizenship. It's actually part of a long train of abuse by the courts in which they have willfully distorted the real meaning of the First Amendment to the Constitution in order to destroy the very right that amendment is meant to guarantee."
Critics of Hostettler's amendment said it would only embolden Senate Democrats who are conducting a filibuster of President Bush's choice to fill a vacancy on the 11th Circuit Court, the same court that ordered the removal of the Ten Commandments sculpture. Bush's nominee, conservative Alabama Attorney General William Pryor, would actually be compelled to enforce the court order to remove the sculpture.
"Certainly, if Pryor failed to obey the court order to remove the Ten Commandments sculpture, that would be further evidence of his unfitness for the bench," Louis Bograd, legal director of the Alliance for Justice, told reporters.
Berns said he did not see how the amendment to the spending bill could greatly affect Pryor's nomination.
"There seems to be little prospect of his ever being confirmed by the Senate anyway," Berns explained.
When asked recently by FOX News Channel talk show host Sean Hannity if he would remove the sculpture, Moore initially answered "No" but later backed off slightly.
Moore has scheduled a Thursday afternoon press conference at the Alabama Supreme Court to announce whether he will obey the court order to remove the sculpture. In the court order, U.S. District Court Judge Myron Thompson said fines up to $5,000 per day could be levied against Moore, "and thus the state of Alabama itself, until the monument is removed."
In addition to Keyes, Saturday's rally in Montgomery in support of Moore and the Ten Commandments monument will feature the Rev. Jerry Falwell.
See Related Story:
Mayor Vetoes Council's Decision to Appeal Ten Commandments Case (Aug. 13, 2003)
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Send a Letter to the Editor about this article.
Good ol' Alan Keyes. FR still loves you after all these years!
Incidentally, VMI is also under attack. Now a split court of appeals let stand a ruling that a nonsectarian and totally voluntary prayer is unconstitutional. ("Split court lets VMI prayer ruling stand" by Larry O'Dell, AP, The Washington Times, August 14, 2003, p. B3)
Judges in this decision who feel a voluntary paryer is unconstitutional: William Wilkins, M. Blane Michael, Dianna Gribbon Motz, William B. Traxler, Robert King, Roger D. Gregory.
I don't expect Hostettler's amendment to make it to the floor of the Senate (because of the anonymous hold)--but I do think that Pryor's judgeship is deader than it was before, whether he acts or doesn't act on the federal judge's order to remove the Ten Commandments.
Looks like Judge Moore may be slapped around by the law of unintended consequences. Of course, all of this could've been avoided had Moore simply requested a continued stay of the order pending Supreme Court review, as Judge Thompson invited him to do. It is still a mystery why Moore chose not to do so - unless he was actually trying to set up a confrontation outside of the courts. If that was his aim, he has no business being a judge.
I brought this up on one of the previous Moore threads--that this may be one of the consequences of Moore's actions. If Pryor does enforce the court order, he loses the support of conservatives. If he doesn't enforce the court order, he hands the Dems a dandy reason to rail against him on the floor of the Senate--"We cannot have an appellate court judge who refuses to recognize an order of a federal court" and on & on & on.
I wonder why Moore doesn't want Pryor on the Court of Appeals?
They seem to have very similar political views. If one were searching for a reason why Moore would not want Pryor on the 11th, it would have to be something else. While I am not suggesting that this is a motivation for Moore, it is certain that many of the religious figures with whom Moore associates do not have a particularly favorable view of Catholicism.
The latter is true, but I get this feeling this is all about Chief Judge Roy Moore--and nothing else. Moore hasn't bothered to think through the consequences to his actions--unless, of course, he's doing political strategizing for a run for another office....the governorship, for instance.
Precisely the argument the Dems are going to use against Pryor--but I'd like to know why Moore thinks he doesn't have to obey an order of the court? He did make arguments to the effect that the federal court doesn't have jurisdiction over him and still makes that argument, but both the district court and the appellate court have ruled against him.
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