Posted on 01/18/2005 9:23:14 PM PST by 82Marine89
A judge's opinion in Germany or India or Zimbabwe shouldn't matter when it comes to how an American judge interprets the U.S. Constitution. But a growing body of activist judges believes that world opinion should play a role in how they decide cases.
That's a radical - and dangerous - departure from more than two centuries of American constitutional law. It's also anti-democratic, placing the decisions of unelected judges above the deliberations of elected representatives. The job of every judge is to exercise judicial judgment, not impose political preferences.
Supreme Court Justices Antonin Scalia and Stephen Breyer on Thursday debated the role foreign court rulings should play in U.S. courts at a forum sponsored by American University. Scalia, a conservative, believes in sticking strictly to the text of the Constitution. Breyer, a liberal, thinks that "world opinion" can be helpful in deciding U.S. cases.
The Supreme Court relied heavily, though not exclusively, on legal opinions from the European Union and Zimbabwe in two consequential decisions: Atkins v. Virginia, a 2002 case that abolished the death penalty for mentally disabled convicts, and Lawrence v. Texas, a 2003 ruling that scrapped state laws banning homosexual behavior.
Trouble is, as Justice Scalia noted, judges are likely to be selective in their use of foreign opinions, cherry-picking those that fit the outcome they're looking for. A foreign court may support the liberal view on the death penalty, for example, but have a far more conservative slant on abortion. So why are Zimbabwe's legal opinions relevant to U.S. jurisprudence on one issue, but not the other?
Of course, American courts also decide cases that relate directly to foreign law - from interpreting treaties and trade agreements to applying anti-trust laws. In this context, other nations' laws and international protocol may be relevant. But in the vast majority of American cases, the U.S. Constitution is the appropriate and consistent benchmark that should guide judges' rulings.
Given the likelihood of President Bush appointing at least one or two Supreme Court justices in the next four years, the question of what role foreign law should play in deciding U.S. cases is fundamental to the high court's - and the nation's - future. Any nominee who believes that international precedents should have a significant, much less persistent, influence on the course of U.S. laws is not the best choice for the bench.
Judges, members of Congress and presidents all take the same oath: "to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States" - not the constitution of the EU or Zimbabwe.
This editorial staff is right-on 99.9% of the time.
Hang them all.
Hang them all.
Want to impeach them first...or later?
Our constitution is ours alone and not an extention of some Frog or German or EU type. They have theirs and we have ours ond the twain shall never meet.
Ok...we'll hang em.
Judges, members of Congress and presidents all take the same oath: "to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States" - not the constitution of the EU or Zimbabwe.
If they succeed in taking our guns away, this is what will come next. They know that if they DARE try this while we are still armed, it could become quite ugly. Americans are a FREE people, and we're not about to give that freedom up without a fight! We're not about to give it up even AFTER a fight. If you vote for a democrat, you're voting against our freedom. I never thought I'd say it, but just look around you. It's incredibly obvious.
For without the 2nd Amendment, there would be no others.
Later.
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