No On Roberts (Joseph Farah Slams Conservatives For Being Bamboozled By White House Alert)

I don't know who makes me sicker – President Bush or the "conservatives" who continue to back him and his sell-out choice for the U.S. Supreme Court.

The conservatives eagerly jumped in to throw their support to the unknown John Roberts as soon as the choice to replace Sandra Day O'Connor was announced.

On what basis? The guy was a blank slate – like David Souter and Anthony Kennedy before him.

Then, last week, the Los Angeles Times broke the story that Roberts had volunteered his services – pro bono – to help prepare a landmark homosexual activist case to be heard by the U.S. Supreme Court.

He did his job well. But he didn't serve the public interest. And he certainly no longer sounds like the carefully crafted image of a jurist who believes in the Constitution and judicial restraint.

The 1996 Romer vs. Evans case produced what the homosexual activists considered, at the time, its most significant legal victory, paving the way for an even bigger one – Lawrence vs. Texas, the Supreme Court ruling that effectively overturned all laws prohibiting sodomy in the United States.

There was some immediate concern expressed by conservatives following the story. But after being assured by the White House that everything was all right, they quickly fell into line, quietly paving the way for what I predict will be a unanimous or near-unanimous confirmation vote in the U.S. Senate.

Some conservatives even suggested the story in the L.A. Times was designed to divide conservatives. If that isn't a case of blaming the messenger! No, the point of the L.A. Times story was to bring the Democrats on board – to reassure them that Roberts is definitely in the mold of Souter and Kennedy.

As disappointing as Bush has been as president, I really didn't expect him to nominate a constitutionalist to replace O'Connor.

But the vast majority of establishment conservative leaders have no idea how they are being manipulated.

They simply buy into the White House talking points, which say Roberts was merely being a good soldier for his law firm.

Roberts was a partner in the firm. His job was not in jeopardy if he excused himself from the case on principled moral grounds. That would have been the honorable thing to do – either that, or resign from a law partnership that took such reprehensible clients.

Now that would be the kind of jurist I could support to serve on the Supreme Court for a lifetime appointment.

Walter A. Smith, the attorney in charge of pro bono work at Hogan & Hartson from 1993 to 1997, who worked with Roberts on the Romer case, said Roberts expressed no hesitation at taking the case. He jumped at the opportunity.

"Every good lawyer knows that if there is something in his client's cause that so personally offends you, morally, religiously, if it offends you that you think it would undermine your ability to do your duty as a lawyer, then you shouldn't take it on, and John wouldn't have," he said. "So at a minimum, he had no concerns that would rise to that level."

Keep in mind the intent and result of this case. It overturned a provision of the Colorado Constitution that blocked special rights for people based on their sexual proclivities.

Roberts did not have a moral problem with that. He did not have a moral problem with helping those activists win a major battle in the culture war. He did not have a moral problem with using the Supreme Court to interfere in the sovereign decisions of a sovereign people in a sovereign state. He did not have a moral problem coaching homosexual activists on how to play politics with the court.

This was not just an "intellectual exercise," as some have suggested. Roberts' actions had real impact on the future of our nation.

He ought to be ashamed of himself as a self-proclaimed Catholic. In some dioceses, he would be denied communion for his betrayal of his faith.

He ought to be denied a confirmation vote by the U.S. Senate. But I predict he will get every Republican vote and nearly all of the Democrat votes.

However, I can't believe that Bush could or would be so "off the mark". Why or how could he be?

Roberts may yet turn out to be okay. We have no alternative but to wait. Bush has made his decision and will not recall it. And, as Farah points out, Roberts' support from Senate Democrats will be unanimous or close to it.

If Roberts turns out to be a mistake like Souter we'll be stuck with it for 30-35 years at least. That's long enough to ensure the social liberal agenda becomes a permanent and unchallengeable part of our laws and lives and the lives of our grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

May God have mercy on us and this nation and may He guide George W. Bush appropriately to that end.

Can you really guarantee he will vote like Scalia and Thomas?

I can't guarantee a damn thing, up to and including that I will live to see the shuttle land tonight.

FGS, run for office if you think you can do a better job.

In contrast, Roberts is a blank slate.

No kidding? Then why did you put this thread up? I mean, are we or are we not DISCUSSING some of his legal work?

Any one can read anything they want into him.

So I see; even things that are not there.

Frankly, I'm sick of all of you who have to find SOMETHING to carp about in every single issue.

This article is sad. How easily a single case is found that can be construed to favor gays, so split off the anti-gays from the strict constructionists.

I do not hold that we should put on the Court only judges who oppose gays in all cases. I hold that we should put on the Court only judges who uphold the constitution in all cases.

Now and then, anyone, even gays, may find that the plain text of the constitution is on their side in a case. So be it.

The gay baiting of this post and its transparent use as a tool to divide us is disgusting.

Here is the summary text of the actual ROMER v. EVANS, ___ U.S. ___ (1996) Supreme Court decision:

Amendment 2 violates the Equal Protection Clause. Pp. 4-14.

(a) The State's principal argument that Amendment 2 puts gays and lesbians in the same position as all other persons by denying them special rights is rejected as implausible. The extent of the change in legal status effected by this law is evident from the authoritative construction of Colorado's Supreme Court - which establishes that the amendment's immediate effect is to repeal all existing statutes, regulations, ordinances, and policies of state and local entities barring discrimination based on sexual orientation, and that its ultimate effect is to prohibit any governmental entity from adopting similar, or more protective, measures in the future absent state constitutional amendment - and from a review of the terms, structure, Page II and operation of the ordinances that would be repealsed and prohibited by Amendment 2. Even if, as the State contends, homosexuals can find protection in laws and policies of general application, Amendment 2 goes well beyond merely depriving them of special rights. It imposes a broad disability upon those persons alone, forbidding them, but no others, to seek specific legal protection from injuries caused by discrimination in a wide range of public and private transactions. Pp. 4-9.

(b) In order to reconcile the Fourteenth Amendment's promise that no person shall be denied equal protection with the practical reality that most legislation classifies for one purpose or another, the Court has stated that it will uphold a law that neither burdens a fundamental right nor targets a suspect class so long as the legislative classification bears a rational relation to some independent and legitimate legislative end. See, e.g., Heller v. Doe, 509 U.S. 312, 319 -320. Amendment 2 fails, indeed defies, even this conventional inquiry. First, the amendment is at once too narrow and too broad, identifying persons by a single trait and then denying them the possibility of protection across the board. This disqualification of a class of persons from the right to obtain specific protection from the law is unprecedented and is itself a denial of equal protection in the most literal sense. Second, the sheer breadth of Amendment 2, which makes a general announcement that gays and lesbians shall not have any particular protections from the law, is so far removed from the reasons offered for it, i.e., respect for other citizens' freedom of association, particularly landlords or employers who have personal or religious objections to homosexuality, and the State's interest in conserving resources to fight discrimination against other groups, that the amendment cannot be explained by reference to those reasons; the Amendment raises the inevitable inference that it is born of animosity toward the class that it affects. Amendment 2 cannot be said to be directed to an identifiable legitimate purpose or discrete objective. It is a status-based classification of persons undertaken for its own sake, something the Equal Protection Clause does not permit. Pp. 9-14.

A clear and substantial case is made here that the Colorado Ammendment 2 violated the plain text of the 14th Ammendment.

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