Ten Commandments Judge Removed From Bench

AP via Yahoo ^ | Thu, Nov 13, 2003 | KYLE WINGFIELD, Associated Press Writer

[Calpernia]

MONTGOMERY, Ala. - Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore was removed from office Thursday for refusing to obey a federal court order to move his Ten Commandments monument from the rotunda of the state courthouse.

The state Court of the Judiciary unanimously imposed the harshest penalty possible after a one-day trial in which Moore said his refusal was a moral and lawful acknowledgment of God. Prosecutors said Moore's defiance, left unchecked, would harm the judicial system.

Moore, a champion of religious conservatives, had been suspended since August but was allowed to collect his $170,000 annual salary. He was halfway through his six-year term.

Speaking immediately after the decision, a defiant Moore told supporters he had only acknowledged God as is done in other official procedures and documents.

"I have absolutely no regrets. I have done what I was sworn to do," he said, drawing applause.

"It's about whether or not you can acknowledge God as a source of our law and our liberty. That's all I've done. I've been found guilty," he said.

Moore said he had consulted with his attorneys and with political and religious leaders and would make an announcement next week which he said "could alter the course of this country." He did not elaborate. He could appeal to the Alabama Supreme Court.

Under Thursday's decision, the governor will appoint someone to serve the rest of Moore's term, which expires in 2006.

Presiding Judge William Thompson said the nine-member court had no choice in its decision after Moore willfully and publicly ignored the federal court order. "The chief justice placed himself above the law," Thompson said.

A federal judge had ruled the monument was an unconstitutional promotion of religion by the government. A federal appeals court upheld the ruling, and the U.S. Supreme Court (news - web sites) refused to hear Moore's appeal. The monument eventually was rolled to a storage room on instructions from the eight associate justices.

The Judicial Inquiry Commission filed the complaint about Moore's defiance with the Court of the Judiciary, an ad hoc panel of judges, lawyers and others appointed variously by judges, legal leaders and the governor and lieutenant governor.

On Thursday Moore said he had no animosity toward the court. But, he said, unless the states stand up, "public acknowledgment of God will be taken from us. In God we trust will be taken from our money and one nation under God from our pledge."

Greg Sealy, head of the Sitting at His Feet Fellowship in Montgomery, an inner-city mission, said it was the "darkest day" he has seen in America since he moved to the United States from Barbados 23 years ago.

"They stole my vote. The judiciary stole my vote. I voted for Roy Moore," he said.

The prosecutor, Attorney General Bill Pryor, on Wednesday termed Moore's defiance "utterly unrepentant behavior" that warranted removal from office.

The chief justice testified he was fulfilling his duties and promises to voters when he refused to follow the court order.

Moore, 56, testified that he followed his conscience and did nothing to violate judicial ethics.

"To acknowledge God cannot be a violation of the Canons of Ethics. Without God there can be no ethics," Moore testified.

He had also reiterated his stance that, given another chance to fulfill the court order, he again would refuse to do so. When one panelist, Circuit Judge J. Scott Vowell of Birmingham, asked Moore what he would do with the monument if he were returned to office, the chief justice said he had not decided, but added: "I certainly wouldn't leave it in a closet, shrouded from the public."

In closing arguments, Assistant Attorney General John Gibbs said Moore's public refusal to obey a court order "undercuts the entire workings of the judicial system."

"What message does that send to the public, to other litigants? The message it sends is: If you don't like a court order, you don't have to follow it," he said.

It was as a circuit court judge in Gadsden in the 1990s that Moore became known as the "Ten Commandments Judge," after he was sued by the American Civil Liberties Union (news - web sites) for opening court sessions with prayer and for displaying a hand carved Ten Commandments display behind his bench.

He said Wednesday that when he ran for chief justice in 2000, his entire campaign was based on "restoring the moral foundation of law." He added that it took him eight months to personally design the monument, which he helped move into the judicial building in the middle of the night on July 31, 2001.

Jones asked Moore why he didn't just go ahead and move the monument as Thompson ordered.

"It would have violated my conscience, violated my oath of office and violated every rule of law I had sworn to uphold," Moore said.

[M1Tanker]

It would be amazing, but it's gotten so common we tend to forget. The left has no problem with judicial activism so long as the activist judges only implement liberal nation socialist policies and ideas. But get someone who isn't an activist judge, is conservative (*shudder*), and actually believes in God.....THAT's Dangerous..... (to the Left)...

But if this judge was on a crusade to impose compulsary athiesm, he would be a "hero" to the Left, the Media, and the "high courts".

[Catspaw]

He'll be making an announcement of great national importance next week. My guess he'll be running for President on the Constitution Party ticket.

[looscnnn]

You don't think they would be watching with magnifying glasses? Even the slightest perceived issue and they would pounce.

[Calpernia]

>>>Moore said he had consulted with his attorneys and with political and religious leaders and would make an announcement next week which he said "could alter the course of this country."

I'm looking up contact info for him now before I have to run off to another activity. I want to contact him on this to see if he needs help/backing/support et al. I'm fed up with all this nonesense.

[apackof2]

Sorry I think I misunderstood you

I thought you meant stop Judge Moore

We need more Judge Moore's

[Calpernia]

Look at this thread.

[M1Tanker]

"I agree, he needed to just lay low on the issue until the judicial branch had been cleaned up."

But how many decades will it take to to fix the courts so they respect the Constitution (the US one, not other countries') and the role of the judiciary in a Constitutional Republic?

[Modernman]

How many of us would obey an order to stop acknowledging God or else we would lose our job?

At what time was Judge Moore asked to stop acknowledging God in any way, shape or form?

If you follow this reasoning, in order to be a judge, one must not acknowledge God. Unless there is a change, our system is doomed.

No, not at all. This ruling had nothing to do with God. It had to do with Moore refusing to follow a court order. A judge whose conscience does not allow him to follow a court order should resign.

[Robe]

IMHO...
This is not about religon, it's about states rights

This effectively states that the Tenth Amendment no longer exists.

It also states that the protection of the constitution of religious expression also is gone.

If a Federal judges can order a state to ignore it's own constitution, a state no longer is sovereign.

We are a republic no more (and haven't been for sometime)

[Veritas01]

Okay, so they're willing to remove a Conservative Judge, but not a liberal one when he makes a wacked out descion, on lets say Partial-Birth Abortion, and is politicly motivated by doing so?

[Modernman]

My guess he'll be running for President on the Constitution Party ticket.

Please, let that be true! It would provide no end of amusement.

[Calpernia]

>>>>The left has no problem with judicial activism so long as the activist judges only implement liberal nation socialist policies and ideas.

Exactly. See my post here for more on what they are doing.

Also, take note of the group, MoveOn.org. They are partnering with the DNC in their own words. MoveOn.org is affiliated with www.cpusa.org (Communists) http://www.cpusa.org/article/articleview/515/1/103

[Calpernia]

No problem. I don't think you and I have been on enough of the same threads for you to 'read my mind'. I wasn't clear in my post #1 on what I wanted stopped.

[pullmyfinger]

"I agree, he needed to just lay low on the issue until the judicial branch had been cleaned up."

If everyone laid low till the judicial branch gets cleaned up, then who is going to clean it up? Who is going to hear about it and get motivated to clean it up? Where would Christianity be with out 2000 years worth of martyrs?

[Catspaw]

Please, let that be true! It would provide no end of amusement.

IIRC, during the rally down in Montgomery, one of the people who introduced Moore was Howard Phillips, Constitution Party presidential candidate in years past.

[Blzbba]

"Without God there can be no ethics. "


I disagree. Millions of worldwide atheists who lead non-criminal lives attest to this. I'm not one of them, but I've seen more criminal activity committed by religious people than non-religious.

[kimoajax]

I hope and pray the Judge has somehow taped into something bigger than himself and by example lit a fire that will spread across this nation.

If slavery were ruled consitutional, as it once was, would a reasonable and moral person expect a judge and thereby all others to abdicate their understanding of what is moral, and merely rest in the knowledge that they are following the law? Would you?

If so, can there be any doubt you would be no different from those Germans who used the same rationale try to explain away doing what they did in WWII? After all, in a sense, they too were merely being good law abiding citizens....doing what the powers that be told them to do.

Really, from where are our nation's laws vested with precepts about what is good, just and moral...and what is not? If not from God, then from where? From the State, from man's reason, from those holding power?

If not from God, then God help us.

[Modernman]

IIRC, during the rally down in Montgomery, one of the people who introduced Moore was Howard Phillips, Constitution Party presidential candidate in years past.

Moore's megalomania knows no bounds. I wonder if he really believes all of this, or whether this is just a ploy to advance his political career?

[Gelato]

This is serious stuff, folks. It is the crux of the problem with our judicial system. If you follow this reasoning, in order to be a judge, one must not acknowledge God. Unless there is a change, our system is doomed.

You're right.

Also, it means that in order to be a law-abiding citizen, you must do whatever a judge says, regardless of the law. Judges now are our rulers.

These days, a judge can even order a person to death (Terri Schiavo).

[Blzbba]

"A judge whose conscience does not allow him to follow a court order should resign."


I agree with your post.