Obama’s Agenda for Judges
Here’s one more reason not to vote for Barack Obama, as any more were needed. According to his campaign, Mr. Obama, if elected to the presidency, has every intention of seating liberal, activist judges.
“Barack Obama,” explained spokesman Tommy Vietor, “has always believed that our courts should stand up for social and economic justice, and what’s truly elitist is to appoint judges who will protect the powerful and leave ordinary Americans to fend for themselves.”
Wrong, wrong, wrong. A judge’s responsibility is to interpret the law as established by the legislature as fairly and impartially as humanly possible. It is not to make new law, to right current or historical inequities, or to promote any ideological agenda, whether left or right.
David Harsanyi again:
“Obama, a graduate of Harvard Law School and a former lecturer on constitutional law at the University of Chicago, knows full well that the Supreme Court isn’t charged with upholding subjective world views”
Barack Obama believes otherwise and demonstrates the true meaning of elitism: an unquestioning assumption that one’s ideological agenda is superior to that of others, particularly the status quo, which has society’s de facto approval.
Vote McCain, save yourself 4 years of pain - to say nothing of the 2 decades of Supreme Court follies that would follow Obama’s appointment of another John Paul Stevens.
Republican’s just want judges to uphold THEIR subjective world views such as expanded presidential powers to suspend habeus corpus or wiretap without warrants, etc.
"Activist judges" Translation: Judges that interpret the Constitution in a manner displeasing to me.
If anything could convince me to vote for Clinton in the highly unlikely event that she got the nomination it’s the fact that the Supreme Court is on the brink of a total conservative majority, and if McCain wins it’ll become conservative for a generation. I know that makes you very happy Marc, but then you think that liberals are fools, or hate America, or something of that nature, so your objectivity is, well, non-existent.
I don’t think I’d want a total liberal majority in the Supreme Court either, in fact I’d much rather have a majority of centrists than those who McCain would nominate, being that he’s already given the quiet assurance that he’ll nominate justices more likely to overturn Roe vs. Wade.
The only assurances you have of what Clinton will do is whatever the current polls indicate the public may like.
Actually the threat of overturning Roe vs Wade is pretty much fear mongering from the left. Simply too much time has passed, and assuming that Conservatives are all on the religious side is - minimalistic at best. There are plenty of Conservatives that approve of Roe vs Wade not for the right to abortion but for the less Government regulation regarding it.
To be fair, there often IS a more principled version from the conservative side: Judges who identify things in the Constitution that were completely unknown to the authors and previous generations of jurists.
I’ll take those judges in a NY minute over another Sam Alito, J0ohn Roberts, Antonin Scalia or Clarence Thomas. And with the most liberal judge, John Stevens, expected to retire within the next 4 years, it is imperative that he be replaced with a liberal, not another Sam Alito, or all of our precious rights and liberties are in danger of being whittled away day-by-day.
Another point. Judges are NOT only supposed to interpret statutes. That is the old Roman law system, modern day incarnation in the Napoleonic code, and the modern French Legal Code. Our system is based in part on the English common law system in which judges interpret law all the time without reference to statutes. They create causes of action, they eliminate them, they expand them and restrict them, all based on case by case experience and how society is evolving.
Finally, our Constitution was intended to be living and adaptable. Restricting judges to interpreting so called original intent is like making the law into a Bible class. Our Founding Fathers would have been aghast that we would consider restricting ourselves to only what they wrote and intended 230 years ago without regard to modern life and modern ideals.
Who says our Constitution was meant to be living and adaptable? I think that is OK, but that is not written anywhere. Activist judges are not just judges that interpret the Constitution in a way that displeases me. They are judges that legislate from the bench, creating new laws and new rights.
You that are decrying loss of rights - then you should want conservative judges - they uphold rights, the separation of powers for the three branches and interpret the Constitution; liberal activist judges want to take away the rights of the other branches and create new laws & regulations from the bench.
I heard Scalia himself, on a radio interview the other week, speaking about the ‘activist judges’ charge. He basically pointed out the fact that there are activist representatives and senators also, and judiciary’s checking them should be seen normal.
"The true meaning of elitism: an unquestioning assumption that one’s ideological agenda is superior to that of others"
Hmmm. So, pray tell, who isnt an elitist?
"A judge’s responsibility is … not … to right current or historical inequities"
What a ludicrous notion! That is precisely what the judiciary is for. What blindness you exhibit! It is an extreme rightwing position to view the judiciary as simply part of the enforcement arm of the legislature and executive. No. the judiciary exists to protect the rights of the weak, those who are not in power, those against whom the the state may tend to act unjustly.
The modern right seems determined to dismiss the very notion of "justice". It seems to be a concept that has no place in your world-view - a word that should be redefined as "that which is in line with the status quo".
Your level of misunderstanding is amazingly profound.
Actually the definition of a liberal judge would indicate you want a judge that would alter your rights instead of giving you what the Constitution allows.
their job is to test a law against the Constitution - not the other way around.
Point that out in the Consitution - where does it say that.
Actually by definition the statement is correct and you are blind in it. it is up to the Legistlative & Executive branches to enact laws - it is the Judiciary that tests those laws to determine the legality.