Perhaps I should be clearer - Judge Moore is in no way legally empowered to second-guess a higher court. Why doesn't that concern you? Because you happen to agree with him on this issue? What about when someone else makes the same claim about a court ruling you happen to like?
As I said above, they're empowered to make rulings based on the Constitution.
Including, I presume, the 14'th Amendment and the Establishment Clause. Or is that an exception to Judge Moore's oath too? ;)
First of all, again I didn't say they could decide for themselves which orders are legal. The orders are either legal, or they're not legal. If they're not legal, then people have the right to disregard them.
The reason we have courts in the first place is because, every once in a while, there is a disagreement about what is legal or illegal, constitutional or unconstitutional. If the law and the Constitution were never the subjects of disagreement, we wouldn't need courts at all - unless, that is, you are offering your services as a sort of Delphic Oracle about legality and illegality. And as much as I respect you, I think I will have to decline...
So then we swing into what appears to be you wanting to turn that difference of opinion into an affirmative defense that empowers people to act in any way they see fit, regardless of what the courts say about it - I apparently don't get to decide which court orders I obey, I just get to decide which are "legal", and then presumably disobey the "illegal" ones. And it is a decision, unless you are claiming that your insights are always and invariably the correct insights - in which case, I look forward to how you will deal with all those usurpers who are claiming that their special insight is better than yours wherever you happen to disagree :^)
But as I said, I don't see any practical difference whatsoever in terms of the effects of those two positions. The first one says that I'm simply not going to obey any laws or court rulings that I don't like, whereas the second says that I'm not going to obey any laws or rulings that are "illegal". And who gets to determine their illegality? Why, I do, of course. And the practical effects are exactly the same in both cases - in both cases, you allow the individual to decide for themselves which laws they will or will not obey. And that's not order, or republic, or liberty - it's simply anarchy.
...the courts have ways of making life unpleasant for you - that is, unless you can convince enough of your fellow-citizens that the order is, in fact, illegal.
Which brings me right back around to an earlier point - why bother having courts or laws or Constitutions in the first place? I'll just take a poll about whether something I want to do is "legal" or not, and then we can skip this whole mess right from the start....
Yes, and it is their job to resolve such disagreements. That's why the agents of the state are predisposed to bring their rulings into force. But that doesn't change the fact that the law itself has a fixed meaning, and that therefore it's not whatever they say it is, even if they are actually able to enforce their (per)version of it.
I apparently don't get to decide which court orders I obey, I just get to decide which are "legal"....
You still misunderstand. An illegal order is illegal regardless of whether or not you've "decided" this fact.
I'll just take a poll about whether something I want to do is "legal" or not, and then we can skip this whole mess right from the start....
You'd have to do considerably more than take a poll. You'd actually have to get people to face the consequences of helping you out, knowing that there's no guarantee that their efforts will be successful.
What's the difference between that and civil disobedience against a law they simply don't like? Not much, except that they're doing so secure in the knowledge that the law is on their side, even if the authorities are not. The purpose of having law is to provide a common standard of reference regarding what we've agreed to allow and not allow.