Free Republic

Statement by Gov. Rick Perry: U.S. Senate Should Reject Nomination of Liberal Judicial Activist Caitlin Halligan AUSTIN – Gov. Rick Perry today issued the following statement: “As New York Solicitor General, Caitlin Halligan used her liberal interpretation of the law to target pro-life Americans, gun owners, and gun manufacturers, and otherwise use the law as a liberal political tool. The last thing the American people need on the second highest court is another liberal judicial activist, like Ms. Halligan, who lacks respect for the U.S. Constitution. “The nomination of liberal activist Caitlin Halligan to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals...

In a pending civil lawsuit in a Texas Federal Court, a constitutional nightmare is occurring that could have ominous consequences for all Americans. In violation of the Constitution, The activist federal judge in this case has made a U.S. business owner essentially a slave without any due process or hearing. All of the relevant details of this profoundly disturbing case are summarized at case overview tab on LawInjustice.com. No case in recent judicial history resembles more of a Stalinist show trial. The conduct appears to be more corruption than merely judicial activism and the litany of outrages occurring are almost...

A federal judge in Austin on Tuesday ruled that key components of Texas' abortion-sonogram law are unconstitutional, stopping the state from enforcing it until a court rules on a legal challenge filed on behalf of several obstetrician-gynecologists. U.S. District Judge Sam Sparks said...the law, which was to take effect Thursday, violates the free speech rights of doctors and patients. He ordered that the state cannot impose penalties against doctors who don't fulfill its requirements. "The Act's onerous requirements will surely dissuade or prevent many competent doctors from performing abortions, making it significantly more difficult for pregnant women to obtain abortions,"...

TALLAHASSEE — Gov. Rick Scott says two state senators suing him because he rejected federal money to build high-speed rail want the court to push their failed policies. His sometimes stinging response filed Wednesday with the Florida Supreme Court calls them "senators whose policy preferences have not prevailed in the political process." Republican Thad Altman and Democrat Arthenia Joyner filed the lawsuit Tuesday, saying Scott overstepped his executive authority by killing the project after the Legislature approved it and appropriated money for it. Oral arguments in the case are set for 3 p.m. today. Both sides have asked the court...

A federal appeals court has overturned the 25-years-to-life sentence of a South Bay man who was caught driving while intoxicated in 1999, six years after a drunken accident that killed a passenger. A Santa Clara County judge based his decision to sentence Rick Wilson under California's "three strikes and you're out" law on findings he made about Wilson's previous crime. That violated Wilson's right to have a jury decide those questions, the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco said in a 2-1 ruling Tuesday. The court cited a 2000 U.S. Supreme Court decision that entitles defendants to...

TRENTON — Wednesday’s long argument over funding New Jersey schools returned to the state Supreme Court, where stark battle lines were drawn. The Newark-based Education Law Center, which advocates for needy students, argued that cuts in school funding made by Gov. Chris Christie and the Legislature last year violate the state’s constitutional obligations. It wants the state ordered to fully bankroll the court-approved school funding formula. In response, the state argues that cuts to education couldn’t be avoided because of the recession — and that the court has no role in how the state spends its money because there’s no...

The Cross in the classroom was removed in the Albert-Magnus Gymnasium after a protest from parents. Even the morning school prayer was reduced to a good morning meditation prayer circle. Regensburg [kath.net] As one father weighed in, the cross was removed from Albert-Magnus Gymnasium's classroom and the usual school prayer was mangled into a neutral good morning circle meditation. This was reported in the Mittelbayrische Zeitung. With this we see the effect Crucifix-ruling of the Federal Constitutional Court.

Jan Brewer is asking a federal court to disallow foreign governments from joining the federal lawsuit. | AP Photo Close By SCOTT WONG | 10/6/10 9:57 AM EDT Updated: 10/6/10 7:21 PM EDT In a new twist in the fight over Arizona’s immigration law, Republican Gov. Jan Brewer on Tuesday asked a federal court to disallow foreign governments from joining the U.S. Department of Justice lawsuit to overturn the law. The move comes in response to a 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruling issued Monday, allowing nearly a dozen Latin American countries — Mexico, Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Costa Rica, Ecuador,...

Thursday September 9, 2010 Iowans Seek to Sack Three Judges who Legalized Gay “Marriage” By Peter J. SmithDES MOINES, Iowa, September 9, 2010 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Retired U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor on Wednesday waded into a unique state electoral battle, where conservatives are seeking to recall from the bench three state Supreme Court justices that legalized same-sex “marriage” in 2009. Speaking at a panel organized by the Iowa State Bar Association in the Hotel Fort Des Moines, O'Connor asserted that “the judges should not be subject to retaliation" from voters for the decisions they render.According to the...

A U.S. judge in Boston has ruled that a federal gay marriage ban is unconstitutional because it interferes with the right a state to define marriage. U.S. District Judge Joseph Tauro on Thursday ruled in favor of gay couples' rights in two separate challenges to the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act. The state had argued the law denied benefits such as Medicaid to gay married couples in Massachusetts, where same-sex unions have been legal since 2004. Tauro agreed, and said the act forces Massachusetts to discriminate against its own citizens....

Warner Todd Huston -- the "Publius" on the right hand side of the photo above -- caught my eye today with this post. It gives me faith that there are some honest elected representatives who still have America's best interests at heart. And this one in NEW JERSEY, yet!!! My favorite sentiment about the U.S. Supreme Court is from that rascal President Andrew Jackson. In 1832 the U.S. Supreme Court issued a decision in Worcester v. Georgia that Old Hickory wasn’t too happy with. In reply he is famous for the sentiment that the Court made its decision and proposed...

As noted in this space countless times, California's government is broken, endemically incapable of addressing the state's most pressing policy issues. As the crisis has deepened, another factor has made itself increasingly evident – intervention by state and federal courts in what used to be political policy decision-making. The chronically unbalanced state budget is the most obvious example of the system's dysfunction. Any major financial decision discomfits someone. Those who feel aggrieved often go to court, seeking either to overturn or at least delay its implementation. One federal judge seized control of the prison health care system, saying the state...

Police need reasons to believe a suspect is dangerous before firing a Taser and can't use their stun gun simply because the person is disobeying orders or acting erratically, a federal appeals court in San Francisco ruled Monday. The decision by the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals sets judicial standards for police and for people who claim they were victims of excessive force after police hit them with a Taser dart. "The objective facts must indicate that the suspect poses an immediate threat to the officer or a member of the public," Judge Kim Wardlaw said in the 3-0...

During his first year in office, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger railed against state lawmakers, calling them "girlie men" and "obstructionists." As he enters his final year, Schwarzenegger is targeting a different branch of government: judges who "are going absolutely crazy." The Republican governor openly complains about the judiciary these days for blocking budget decisions and forcing California to find billions of dollars elsewhere. Recent judgments have contributed to the state's $20.7 billion projected deficit. Courts have ruled that California's attempts to divert transit and redevelopment money are illegal. They have found in some cases that the state cannot furlough workers. They...

SAN FRANCISCO -- The Obama administration refused Friday to follow a federal judge's order to provide insurance benefits to the wife of a lesbian court employee in San Francisco and said its hands were tied by a discriminatory law. "This issue shows exactly why Congress needs to repeal" the law, which prohibits federal benefits to same-sex couples, government lawyer Elaine Kaplan said in a message to attorneys for court employee Karen Golinski. One of Golinski's lawyers, Jenny Pizer of the gay-rights group Lambda Legal, said Kaplan's response was "something we might have expected from the Bush or Reagan administration, and...

Federal Bench: Yet another judicial nominee seeks to impose the "empathy" standard on the courts. He thinks judges should base rulings on a plaintiff's status, legislate from the bench and amend the Constitution. Indiana federal judge David Hamilton stands poised to be confirmed by the U.S. Senate to assume a seat on the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals serving Illinois, Indiana and Wisconsin. He's a former fundraiser for Acorn and a former leader of the Indiana chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union. He is also another in a series of activist judges who believe the U.S. Constitution is not...

Judiciary: The nominee for a California federal district court is an ACLU activist and another advocate for the empathy standard of jurisprudence. He also has a problem with "America the Beautiful." The nomination of Edward Chen is the latest in a series of nominations of people who have no particular fondness for the traditions of law and justice. These nominees see racism everywhere, and believe the courts should be used as instruments of social justice and not to discern the intent of the Founding Fathers who wrote the U.S. Constitution. They believe their "life experience" should be the final arbiter...

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger wants to file an appeal with the U.S. Supreme Court of a federal order to reduce the state's prison population by more than 40,000 inmates over the next two years, his office announced Tuesday. A federal three-judge panel last month ordered California officials to reduce the state's prison population because overcrowding has led to unconstitutional levels of care. The order required the state to present a reduction plan by Sept. 18. Schwarzenegger on Tuesday asked the panel to delay that order, a procedural move likely to be rejected. If that happens, the governor plans to file a...

San Francisco -- A federal court panel ordered California on Tuesday to reduce the population of its bulging prisons by 40,000 over the next two years to meet constitutional standards for inmate health care, and said it could be done without releasing dangerous prisoners to the streets. "The convergence of tough-on-crime policies and an unwillingness to expend the necessary funds to support the population growth has brought California's prisons to the breaking point," the three-judge panel said. Unless the courts intervene, the panel said, inmates will continue to suffer and die needlessly because prisons lack the space and the staff...

Our greatest liberties come from the constitution. Having power hungry ideological judges misinterpret it, could only bring us back into the bondage of tyranny and oligarchy. The Founders of this great land were wise enough to put three branches of US Government in place, so one could keep the other in check, preventing unconstitutional governance. We are gradually losing this as a nation. Presidents, politicians and special interest groups lobby for Judicial nominees who would rule according to their ideology, while rejecting those who simply follow the guidance of the constitution of the United States. Yet something is brewing in...