Posted on 03/03/2014 11:11:11 AM PST by reaganaut1
My son's 3rd grade school teacher requires students to write a report about a famous black American for Black History month. He took my suggestion to write about Clarence Thomas. Students are supposed to list the ten important things the person has done. What would your list be for Clarence Thomas? The most important thing Thomas has done is recognize that judges are supposed to interpret the constitution as written, not to legislate from the bench. This is a fairly abstract idea both for 3rd-graders and modern liberals. I need suggestions for fleshing out this idea.
The wife nixed my suggestion that my son write about all the important ways Obama has changed America.
You could quote some of his dissents against the statist oligarchs that make up the rest of the Not So Supreme Court, but then the argument would be that he hadn’t really CHANGED anything because the tyrants still came out on top. I guess you could say that even with those dissents he educates people about how freedom is SUPPOSED to limit the government. Plus, they have made a few correct decisions, and he wrote some of them, so you can cite those.
I guess rising to become the only SCOTUS justice worth a damn is an achievement in and of itself.
And you could include “Standing up to liberal filth slandering him during confirmation without caving”
Survived a confirmation process that included a gauntlet of fascists and bigots.
Justice Thomas understands Natural Law Theory. I would use that to teach my child about that Theory, which determines our “Individual Rights from God” and the concepts of Civil Rights and Bill of Rights.
Majorities (even if the majority vote to kill babies) should not be allowed to destroy those Natural Rights from God for each human being which predate the Constitution.
HOW THE COURT BECAME SUPREME
by Robert Lowry Clinton
http://www.firstthings.com/article/2008/11/001-how-the-court-became-supreme
Until the Civil War, the Executive & Legislative branches exercised the primary actions of interpreting the Constitution. The Court’s Constitutional domain was largely restricted to matters concerning its own operations.
Brown (1954) marked a milestone as the Legislature shirked its duty to render justice to African-Americans in the face of Dixiecrat pressure.
“Old Man River” Paul Robeson was giving America’s 60 Families a bad name in Stalin’s Russia. Congress was politically paralyzed.
“The rest is history.”
Right you are!
He doesn’t just recognize that their job is to interpret it as written, but to apply it as it was understood by the people that wrote and ratified it - to try to understand and comply with the original intent of the law, not look for ways to use the letter of the law to violate the intent.
Thomas' achievements encompass his entire life, not just his time on the bench. His decisions rendered on the bench are less important than the things he did/rose above to become a Supreme Court justice--from childhood through adulthood. Start with his autobiography. Or maybe there is a biography of Thomas geared toward young readers.
Why nt actually find out about Clarence Thomas’s life and struggles. Good lord man do some research. He has many accomplishments not the least of which is getting into college, graduating college, passing the bar, heading up several federal departments, being appointed to the SCOTUS.
1948 Georgia near Savannah in a town called pin Point with NO sewage system..... tough way to start a life.
Why don’t you at least start at Google or Wiki and read some?
He was chairman of the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission for eight years, where he promoted self-reliance and halted the usual approach of filing class-action discrimination lawsuits; instead he pursued acts of individual discrimination.
Clarence Thomas is the second black man to serve on the Supreme Court
As a member of the SCOTUS, Thomas votes strongly in favor of state-government over federal-government.
He has influenced the court to take a closer look at the original meaning of the United States Constitution.
1. A descendent of American slaves. Born into a very poor family. His father left his mother and his mother struggled to raise her three children. When her house was destroyed in a fire, he went to live with his maternal grandfather. For the first time, Clarence lived in a home with indoor plumbing and had regular meals.
2. Clarence’ grandfather taught him the value of hard work and a good education. He starting working at the age of 10, on a farm. His grandfather taught him, “never let the sun catch you in bed.” He was the only black student in his school, a Catholic School. This was at a time that the public schools were segregated. And, he was the first person in his family to go to college.
3. Clarence learned to speak English properly because he spoke Gullah as a child (a creole language).
4. Clarence read many books and formed his own personal philosophy. He says he was influenced greatly by Ayn Rand, the Russian-American who wrote Atlas Shrugged, and Richard Wright, the African American who wrote Native Son.
5. When he completed his studies at Yale Law School, he got a job as an Assistant Attorney General for the state of Missouri. In that job, he worked on criminal appeals and other matters. He says it was the best job he ever had. He had a close relationship with his boss because of their religious beliefs, although one was Catholic and the other Protestant.
6. He later got a job as Chairman of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission with President Ronald Reagan. In that job, he focused on cases where individuals suffered because of illegal discrimination.
7. At a later time, he was nominated to be a member of the U.S. Supreme Court by President George H.W. Bush. His nomination hearings were very controversial. Possibly the most controversial of anyone subsequently confirmed.
8. As a member of the U.S. Supreme Court, Clarence Thomas has emerged as the quiet leader of the conservative wing of the court. His colleague Antonin Scalia would be the vocal leader. Justice Thomas is more famous for his dissenting opinions than he is for his majority opinions.
9. Clarence Thomas wrote a book, My Grandfather’s Son, in which he describes his personal life. It became a bestseller.
10. Clarence Thomas is known to be a friendly man and treats everybody with respect from his colleagues with whom he occasionally disagrees, to the janitors and cafeteria workers who work in the Supreme Court building. One of the things he especially likes is driving around this great country of ours in his RV.
Read his autobiography last summer. Fascinating story, and even though I already admired the man, I admired him even more.
You could also say that he worked for the Department of Education, and was appointed by President Reagan to the EEOC, and subsequently nominated by President GHW Bush to the USSC.
I'm sure you could, with a little research, find more details about each of those stints. Each of them is an accomplishment in itself, and shouldn't be glossed over.
(In the McDonald v. Chicago decision) He reminded the court that our civil rights are not protected by just the US government, but exist at every level. That every part of every government in the US must protect our rights.
...and God provides no right to homosexuality. His Word doesn’t stutter in its condemnation of the behavior.
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