Free Republic

Suppose, to be supposing, that you live and own a car in Memphis or Nashville or Chattanooga. Suppose, further, that you believe passionately in a pregnant woman's right to an abortion. Suppose, once more, that the state of Tennessee issues specialty automobile license plates bearing the anti-abortion legend "Choose Life." Suppose, finally, that Tennessee legislators refuse to issue licenses that say, as an alternative, "Pro-Choice." Put these hypotheticals all together, and you have American Civil Liberties Union v. Philip Bredesen, Governor . The case is now pending in the U.S. Supreme Court on a petition for appeal from the 6th...

Is there any room for Moses in an American courthouse? Or must the old lawgiver of Exodus 20 be forever banished into outer darkness? The Supreme Court may give us a hint after it hears argument in two cases presenting the same tough question: Is it constitutionally permissible for an agency of government, such as a public park or a county courthouse, to display the Ten Commandments? On this issue, the lower federal courts are sharply divided. In Van Orden v. Perry, the 5th Circuit said yes, it's OK. In McCreary County v. ACLU, the 6th Circuit said no, it's...

"When it is not necessary to change," said Lord Falkland, "it is necessary not to change." His lordship was propounding that sound advice in 1641. Today, as Congress looks toward approval of a remarkably dumb constitutional amendment, his maxim provides a useful guide. The pending Flag Amendment may not be a constitutional disaster. It would surely amount to an unnecessary change. This is the proposal approved in the House by a vote of 286-130 on June 22: "The Congress shall have power to prohibit the physical desecration of the flag of the United States." A sensible Senate will bury this...

The Supreme Court ended its current term on Monday with more of a whimper than a bang. In the Ten Commandments cases, the justices further muddied the muddy waters of the First Amendment. In a Colorado case, they found no way to compensate a victim of grossly incompetent cops. They refused even to hear the appeal of two reporters who face prison for doing their job. Then they doffed their robes and departed for the summer. One is reminded of Oliver Cromwell's farewell to the Rump Parliament of 1653: "You have sat too long for any good you have done....

The Supreme Court had no choice last week. Confronting a nationwide issue of church and state, the court had to accept two cases involving display of the Ten Commandments on public property. One case came from Kentucky. Said the 6th Circuit: The Constitution forbids such a display. The other case came from Texas. Said the 5th Circuit: The Constitution does not forbid such a display. Both cases involve the same 10 words in the First Amendment: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion." Every word seems clear enough for everyday understanding. In truth, every word has become...

Gilbert & Sullivan provide abundant authority for the truism that a policeman's lot is not a happy one. That goes for policewomen, too. Ask Detective Rochelle Brosseau of Puyallup, Wash. The city of Puyallup (pop. 32,000) lies just east of Tacoma. On the afternoon of Feb. 21, 1999, it was the scene of a fight, a shooting, a brief auto chase, and an arrest for attempting to elude the police. Now the incident is in the U.S. Supreme Court on a petition for review. The question is whether Officer Brosseau acted unreasonably when she shot and wounded Kenneth J. Haugen....

The Supreme Court flunked a tough test on April 5. Instead of accepting three cases arising under the Clean Water Act, the court walked away from them. It was not the court's finest hour. What happened? The three cases came from Maryland, Virginia and Michigan. In each of them the fundamental question was the same: Does Congress have dominion over roadside ditches and insignificant wetlands? The high court refused to say yes or no. It clammed up. The cases were important. By refusing to hear them, the high court encourages the Corps of Engineers to pursue its unrelenting grab for...

The Supreme Court dived into the First Amendment last week and came up sputtering. The court ruled 7-2 that a state may discriminate against divinity students in its program of college scholarships, but the majority opinion by Chief Justice Rehnquist was remarkably unconvincing and the two dissents were uninspired. No one disputed the facts. Five years ago the state of Washington created a Promise Scholarship Program. The idea was to reward graduates from both public and private high schools who meet certain criteria. To be eligible, a student (1) must have graduated in the top 15 percent of his graduating...

AN INDECENT PROPOSAL By James J. Kilpatrick Let me quote from the text of a wretched proposal. It reads: "Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives, that the following article is proposed as an amendment to the Constitution of the United States: "Marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and a woman. Neither this Constitution, nor the Constitution of any state, nor state or federal law, shall be construed to require that marital status or the legal incidents thereof be conferred upon unmarried couples or groups." Incredibly, this miserably drafted resolution has...

WHEN IS A SEIZURE A SEARCH? Robert Lidster's bad luck was to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Just after midnight on Aug. 30, 1997, he was driving along a highway in Lombard, Ill., 25 miles west of downtown Chicago. He ran into a police checkpoint -- literally ran into a checkpoint -- and now he's part of the case law construing the Fourth Amendment. The Fourth Amendment protects us from "unreasonable" searches and seizures. The question in Lidster's case is a constantly recurring question before the Supreme Court. Was a given search reasonable or unreasonable? The...

The restless ghost of Roscoe Filburn has returned. A good thing, too. Filburn was the spunky Ohio farmer who challenged the U.S. government in a famous case 60 years ago. Now his case figures in the plea of two seriously ill California women. They have sued for the right to obtain marijuana on a doctor's recommendation. Filburn lost, but the women so far are winning. The plaintiffs are Angel McClary Raich and Diane Monson. Two years ago they brought suit against Attorney General John Ashcroft, seeking an injunction to forestall their prosecution under the federal Controlled Substances Act. The act...

HIS OWN SIGN, HIS OWN PROPERTY Pat Barber is a lawyer who feels strongly about both the First and the Fourth Amendments. Nothing unusual there. But Barber put up a billboard to express his view. The Texas Supreme Court made him take it down. Now he's asking the U.S. Supreme Court to put it back. The facts are clear. Barber lives and practices law in the West Texas town of Colorado City (pop. 4,281). In 1997 he erected the offending billboard on vacant land he owns adjacent to Interstate 20 in Mitchell County. This was no itsy-bitsy roadside sign. It...