Justice O'Connor: U.S. must rely on foreign law

WND ^

[stop_fascism]

American courts need to pay more attention to international legal decisions to help create a more favorable impression abroad, said U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor at an awards dinner in Atlanta.

Sandra Day O'Connor

"The impressions we create in this world are important, and they can leave their mark," O'Connor said, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

The 73-year-old justice and some of her high court colleagues have made similar appeals to foreign law, not only in speeches and interviews, but in some of their legal opinions. Her most recent public remarks came at a dinner Tuesday sponsored by the Atlanta-based Southern Center for International Studies.

The occasion was the center's presentation to her of its World Justice Award.

O'Connor told the audience, according to the Atlanta paper, the U.S. judicial system generally gives a favorable impression worldwide, "but when it comes to the impression created by the treatment of foreign and international law and the United States court, the jury is still out."

She cited two recent Supreme Court cases that illustrate the increased willingness of U.S. courts to take international law into account in its decisions.

In 2002, she said, the high court regarded world opinion when it ruled executing the mentally retarded to be unconstitutional.

American diplomats, O'Connor added, filed a court brief in that case about the difficulties their foreign missions faced because of U.S. death penalty practices.

More recently, the Supreme Court relied partly on European Court decisions in its decision to overturn the Texas anti-sodomy law.

"I suspect," O'Connor said, according to the Atlanta daily, "that over time we will rely increasingly, or take notice at least increasingly, on international and foreign courts in examining domestic issues."

Doing so, she added, "may not only enrich our own country's decisions, I think it may create that all important good impression."

In July, O'Connor made a rare television news show appearance with Supreme Court Justice Stephen G. Breyer in which they were asked whether the U.S. Constitution, the oldest governing document in use in the world today, will continue to be relevant in an age of globalism.

Speaking with ABC News' "This Week" host George Stephanopoulos, Breyer took issue with Justice Antonin Scalia, who, in a dissent in the Texas sodomy ruling, contended the views of foreign jurists are irrelevant under the U.S. Constitution.

Breyer had held that a ruling by the European Court of Human Rights that homosexuals had a fundamental right to privacy in their sexual behavior showed the Supreme Court's earlier decision to the contrary was unfounded in the Western tradition.

"We see all the time, Justice O'Connor and I, and the others, how the world really – it's trite but it's true – is growing together," Breyer said. "Through commerce, through globalization, through the spread of democratic institutions, through immigration to America, it's becoming more and more one world of many different kinds of people. And how they're going to live together across the world will be the challenge, and whether our Constitution and how it fits into the governing documents of other nations, I think will be a challenge for the next generations."

In his dissent in the Texas case, Scalia said: "The court's discussion of these foreign views (ignoring, of course, the many countries that have retained criminal prohibitions on sodomy) is ... meaningless dicta. Dangerous dicta, however, since this court ... should not impose foreign moods, fads, or fashions on Americans," he said quoting the 2002 Foster v. Florida case.

Scalia's scathing critique of the 6-3 sodomy ruling was unusual in its bluntness.

"Today's opinion is the product of a court, which is the product of a law-profession culture, that has largely signed on to the so-called homosexual agenda, by which I mean the agenda promoted by some homosexual activists directed at eliminating the moral opprobrium that has traditionally attached to homosexual conduct," he wrote. Later he concluded: "This court has taken sides in the culture war."

The current court is split between Chief Justice William Rehnquist, Clarence Thomas and Scalia, who tend to hold the traditional constitutionalist approach to rulings, and the majority of O'Connor, Breyer, Kennedy, Ruth Bader Ginzburg, David H. Souter and John Paul Stevens, who tend to believe in the concept of a "living Constitution" subject to changes in public opinion and interpretation.

[stop_fascism]

Treason isn't limited to democrats.

[Ingtar]

Impeach her!

[Naspino]

How about the foreigners pay attention to us instead of the other way around.

[jmcclain19]

Good grief, I can understand Ginsberg spouting this rationale, but now O'Connor??? Has she lost all sanity. I was more than hoping to see her take Rehnquist's place should he retire. But with ideas like this, there is no way she can be trusted as the Chief Justice. We live under the Constitution of the United States - how about governing to that.

[Dixielander]

The woman is indeed treasonous and should be impeached post haste.

So many of the courts across this land are out of control that we must start paying attention and take action against those who seek to destroy the very constitution that has made the U.S. the envy of the world.

[Frank_Discussion]

If she wants us beholden to "International Law" (feh) why don't we start with her? Send her to the Hague!

[Fun Bob]

Could we have the url to that story please? I'd like to spread it around but want to know the original source. Thanks.

[Callahan]

How long before Souter starts citing Libyan traffic court rulings? Renquist-Scalia-Thomas must feel like they have their fingers in the dyke (no pun intended).

[Dallas59]

Our nation has become so afraid of offending someone. That includes our courts. Common sense has flown out the door.

Just make everything legal. That way our poor judges and lawmakers won't have to worry.

[logic101.net]

Perhaps she is on the wrong court if she wants to worry about international law. Perhaps she should be on the "world court" where they would take an oath to uphold international law, instead of the oath she took to uphold and defend the CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES!

Mark A Sity
http://www.logic101.net/

[JoJo Gunn]

http://worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=35367

[ken5050]

Behold..the longterm efect of hormone replacement therapy..she's having a "hot flash"..no doubt caused by the solar flares..

[justshutupandtakeit]

Before jumping to the conclusion she should be drawn and quartered wouldn't it be appropriate to have her actual speech?

Or do you actually depend on the word of the Atlanta Constipation for most of your information?

[JoJo Gunn]

[birdsman]

She wouldn't have replaced Rehnquist as CJ even before she made this boneheaded statement. Most court watchers agree that it's even money that she'll retire before Rehnquist.

[justshutupandtakeit]

We wouldn't want to actually read the exact words she spoke now. That would put you out of step with the Always Ready to Hang Brigade march to the gallows.

Imagine taking the word of the Atlanta J-C? LoL.

[george wythe]

I suppose that O'Connor is acting like a liberal idiot in these public forums to make easier her confirmation as a Chief Justice in case she is nominated.

Otherwise, she might be losing her mind, or she might have been misquoted.

[Dixielander]

LOL! You're quick!

[catpuppy]

When future generations write the history of what happened to America, such foolishness as expressed by Justice O'Connor will serve as a prime example.

Substituting "... that all important good impression" for the rule of law as embodied in our Constitution may make O'Connor and others heroes of the international community they seem to worship but will ultimately result in the decline and destruction of American freedom and independence.

[Digger]

Old Hitler/Goebels(sp) had it right - feed the people a bunch of lies repeatedely & soon they will be believing them. Where else in this fine nation will you find the more corruption than in Washington D.C. As far as this SC goes, I doubt if any of these pukes will resign if GW stays on. But even if they do I doubt if GW has the gumption to allow conservatives on the SC. He's still a pawn of the NWO.