Free Republic

If Hillary Clinton should enter the Oval Office as president, just think what will happen to the Supreme Court and America for generations. Right now, the balance of the Court is evenly divided between those whose thoughts lean closer to those of the late Justice Scalia and those on the opposite end of the spectrum, who would use the courts to impose the agenda of the progressive left. The very nature of our government and our society will be fundamentally and fatally impacted should Hillary Clinton become the next president. She will select leftist justices to replace existing justices as...

Even the sole good reason for electing Trump — blocking Clinton's certain appointment of liberal Supreme Court justices — falls apart under scrutiny. Does anyone actually believe Trump is steeped in conservative judicial philosophy enough to appoint a justice willing to practice judicial humility? Asking Trump to properly identify a conservative jurist is like asking your dentist to perform your next prostate exam. And in that case, you at least get a new toothbrush out of the deal. (The best strategy seems to preserve Anthony Kennedy and Clarence Thomas in Han Solo-style carbonite and hold our breath until 2020.)

<p>Donald Trump’s list of potential Supreme Court nominees sends multiple messages — all smart, and some pretty subtle.</p> <p>The main point, of course, was to reassure Republicans that he really would name a new justice in the mold of Antonin Scalia — someone who’d resist the temptation to read his or her own policy preferences into the Constitution and the law.</p>

Today Donald J. Trump released the much-anticipated list of people he would consider as potential replacements for Justice Scalia at the United States Supreme Court. This list was compiled, first and foremost, based on constitutional principles, with input from highly respected conservatives and Republican Party leadership. Mr. Trump stated, “Justice Scalia was a remarkable person and a brilliant Supreme Court Justice. His career was defined by his reverence for the Constitution and his legacy of protecting Americans’ most cherished freedoms. He was a Justice who did not believe in legislating from the bench and he is a person whom I...

Don Willett is a Texas Supreme Court justice:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don_Willett David Stras is an associate justice on the Minnesota Supreme Court:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Stras Allison Eid is a justice on the Colorado Supreme Court:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allison_H._Eid Joan Larsen is a justice on the Michigan Supreme Court.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joan_Larsen Steven Colloton is a federal judge who has served on the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steven_Colloton Raymond Gruender is a federal judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raymond_Gruender Thomas Hardiman is a federal judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Hardiman Raymond M. Kethledge is a federal judge...

Trump's picks include Steven Colloton of Iowa, Allison Eid of Colorado and Raymond Gruender of Missouri. Also on the list are: Thomas Hardiman of Pennsylvania, Raymond Kethledge of Michigan, Joan Larsen of Michigan, Thomas Lee of Utah, William Pryor of Alabama, David Stras of Minnesota, Diane Sykes of Wisconsin and Don Willett of Texas. Trump had previously named Pryor and Sykes as examples of kind of justices he would choose.

Richard Lugar (IL) - Primaried out of office Olympia Snowe (ME) - retired after primary threat Judd Gregg (NH) - gone! Kit Bond (MO) - gone! George Voinovich (OH) - gone! Mel Martinez (FL) - gone! Lamar Alexander (TN) - who's surprised? Lindsey Graham (SC) - who's surprised? Susan Collins (ME) - only republican senator who rates BELOW democrats Unfortunately, Mitch has a whole NEW group of linguini-spined moderates: Rounds, Tillis, Ayotte, Capito, etc.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- A black-draped chair on the Supreme Court bench once signaled that a justice had died, but those somber memorials have been increasingly uncommon at the court as its members have chosen to retire rather than hold their office until death.

Personally, I was shocked when the "queen of conservatism" came out for Donald Trump. Phyllis Schafly has been a conservative icon for so long, and even though I've disagreed with her a couple times in the recent past, I was flabbergasted that she would pick somebody who openly declares that he doesn't see his need of asking God's forgiveness for anything. I realize she predicated her choice on what he claims to be his stand on immigrants, and how he says he will deal with the illegals. However, has she been listening to him or just reading what she wants...

"...................The Senate Judiciary Committee, which conducts hearings on presidential nominees to the High Court, currently consists of 11 Republicans and 9 Democrats. Republicans hold a 54-member majority in the Senate, the governing body that confirms presidential nominees to the Court. If these numbers remain unchanged or only slightly changed under a Republican president, that president would have wide latitude to nominate candidates who have tested and principled commitments to conservatism. Let’s say the presidential election favored a Democrat. A Democratic president could simply replace the departing Justice Ginsburg or Justice Breyer with a jurist in their mold, in effect filling...

Two Oklahoma death row inmates (whose crimes both involved the brutal rape and murder of children) sued the government in order to find out the source of the drugs used in the lethal injection that they would receive. After the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals gave the go-ahead for the executions, the state’s Supreme Court granted an indefinite appeal to the inmates. However, an Oklahoma House member drafted a resolution to impeach the justices who granted the stay, precipitating a 180 degree turnaround by the OK Supreme Court. From The Guardian: The Oklahoma supreme court has dissolved its stay of...

Despite growing controversy over the use of anonymous pharmacies for lethal injections, the U.S. Supreme Court has thus far declined to block any executions based on 11th-hour appeals challenging the drug connections. That includes the case of Michael Taylor, a convicted rapist and murderer who was put to death at 12:10 a.m. Wednesday in Missouri after a furious legal battle that stretched well into the night. It's worth nothing, however, that three high court justices wanted to block Taylor's execution and cited the words of an appeals judge who said so little was known about the source of the deadly...

Hacktivist group Anonymous took control of the U.S. Sentencing Commission website Friday, January 25 in a new campaign called "Operation Last Resort." The first attack on the website was early Friday morning. The second - successful - attack came around 9pm PST that evening. anonymous By 3am PST ussc.gov was down (it has since been dropped from the DNS), yet as of this writing the IP address (66.153.19.162) still returns the defaced site's contents. It appears that via the U.S. government website, Anonymous had distributed encrypted government files and left a statement on the website that de-encryption keys would be...

The way liberals see it, the Supreme Court’s four liberal justices often side with conservatives on major cases. Why, then, don’t we see outrage from liberals when one of their justices breaks rank, as we saw with conservatives when Chief Justice John Roberts voted to uphold the constitutionally of Obamacare? In fact, it’s hard to think of any examples of liberals being outraged at liberal justices for crossing the ideological divide.

Madison - Justice David Prosser has now asked all his colleagues on the state Supreme Court to step aside in his ethics case. One justice has already recused herself, and Prosser is not expected to participate in the case. If two others remove themselves, the case will effectively end because at least four of the court's seven justices are needed to take any action. Prosser is accused of violating the state ethics code for judges by putting his hands on the neck of Justice Ann Walsh Bradley after she confronted him face to face in her office in June 2011....

President Obama on Monday nominated two lawyers to fill vacancies on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, a powerful panel to which he has so far been unable to appoint anyone since taking office. Mr. Srinivasan also represented several clients at O'Melveny and Myers that conservatives are likely to criticize him over, filing amicus briefs on behalf of groups opposed to voter photographic identification laws and supporting affirmative action policies in university admissions. Republicans cited several reasons for their opposition to Ms. Halligan, including that as New York's solicitor general she had advanced the...

With U.S. policymakers distracted by the situation in Honduras, Nicaragua continues to move toward authoritarianism. On October 19, a Nicaraguan Supreme Court panel overturned a constitutional provision limiting presidents to two non-consecutive terms in office. The ruling will allow incumbent Nicaraguan president Daniel Ortega--the Sandinista party leader, former Soviet client, vociferous critic of the United States, and current Hugo Chávez acolyte--to run for another term in 2011. If there were any doubts that Nicaraguan democracy is slowly being extinguished, this latest development should remove them. The Nicaraguan Supreme Court is composed of 16 members. Thanks to a political deal made...

Couric: Let's take a look at what you said recently regarding the upcoming Supreme Court decision on your health care legislation: “I’m confident that the Supreme Court will not take what would be an unprecedented, extraordinary step of overturning a law that was passed by a strong majority of a democratically elected Congress.” You claim it would be "unprecedented" if the justices overturn this law. But isn't that the proper role of the courts, and hasn't it happened many times before? Obama: Clearly, I was talking about important laws like this, which were enacted during my administation. So since...

When the U.S. Supreme Court is in session, each Wednesday and Friday afternoon is set aside for an esoteric conclave known as the Justices' Conference. During these private meetings, the justices discuss cases they have recently heard or might decide to hear. The first order of business usually involves the latter, requests from various litigants for the high court to review cases that have been adjudicated by lower courts. Typically, these cases have already been through the appellate process, but occasionally the justices receive a "petition for certiorari before judgment" asking them to consider the decision of some District Court...

Juror's research led to murder mistrial By Bob Kalinowski (Staff Writer) Published: January 17, 2011 Legal experts have coined them "Google mistrials." Curious jurors seeking to conduct their own research surf the Internet about facts presented in court, bringing a halt to important court cases and tainting the outcome. Sometimes it's done unwittingly. Other times it's done against a judge's specific directions. On Friday, it ended Lamont Cherry's murder trial in Luzerne County court. A juror admitted to researching medical issues at home on her computer after five hours of deliberations Thursday ended in a deadlocked panel, prompting a cloud...