Posted on 08/26/2006 7:03:38 PM PDT by Amendment10
I cannot believe your comment about the SCOTUS determining intent! :^( Maybe you haven't read my other posts yet.
Regardless what Justice Black wanted everybody to think about Jefferson's "wall of separation," I've posted three Jefferson extracts where Jefferson acknowledges the power of the states to address religious issues in some way. In fact, two of the extracts reference how the Founders wrote the 1st and 10th Amendments in part to delegate government power to address religious issues uniquely to the state governments.
So I don't know where you're coming from with respect to defending the USSC's determination of the intentions of the Founders given they obviously got the wires crossed big time with Jefferson.
In fact, note that regardless that secularists will argue that the USSC has the power to essentially read anything they want to into the Constitution in the name of case precedent, they ignore that Justice Marshall set the precedent that judges are bound by the Constitution.
"Thus, the particular phraseology of the constitution of the United States confirms and strengthens the principle, supposed to be essential to all written constitutions, that a law repugnant to the constitution is void, and that courts, as well as other departments, are bound by that instrument." --Mr. Chief Justice Marshall, Marbury v. Madison 1803. http://tinyurl.com/qf2vw
Once it was forgotten that the intent of the 14th Amendment was pretty narrow: namely the protection of the rights of Africian-Americans, the courts began to invest the language with all sorts of other meanins. For instance, the restriction of the power of the states to regulate corporations by regarding them as "persons." Then with the Great War came the process of "nationalizing" the Bill of Rights and applying them to the States, even though most States, if not all, already had such bills. Logically, the hold of the states over relgious bodies ought to have been loosened, except that the intent of the courts became the restriction of religious freedom, since that freedom was regarded as dangerous as political dissent. I find it ironical that many American liberals regard Christianity, at least in its traditional form, as seditious as the Chinese government does. If they could they would establish a federal agency to govern the several churches and, in a sense, the IRS serves that function.
How does one stay away....
The more serious problem goes to the theoretical balance of powers. None such exist. The courts are the supreme authority in the government. The Executive and the Judicial branches will never make the Constitutional claim that they are not under the authority of the SCOTUS. There is not the political will to opposed the dictatorial, absolute authority of the courts.
In practice we are not a republic. We are an oligarchy. The Constitution specifically forbids one granch of government from assuming absolute authority. That is precisely what the SCOTUS has done, unopposed.
"So I disagree that the Supreme Court misinterpreted Jefferson's statement. What happened, in fact, was that the 14th Amendment opened the door for an override of the limits on the powers of the federal government, as mrsmith correctly points out. It didn't misinterpret TJ, it ignored him (and the 10th Amendment)."
Where did you get the idea that Justices who swear to defend the Constitution can simply ignore amendments on a whim? As I posted elsewhere, Justice Marshall set the precedent that judges are bound by the Constitution:
"Thus, the particular phraseology of the constitution of the United States confirms and strengthens the principle, supposed to be essential to all written constitutions, that a law repugnant to the constitution is void, and that courts, as well as other departments, are bound by that instrument." --Mr. Chief Justice Marshall, Marbury v. Madison 1803. http://tinyurl.com/qf2vw
"Welcome to Free Republic. Those of us who study and revere the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights in particular, will gladly engage you in all the debate you care to join. Your handle suggests you're looking forward to it too."
What I've seen being revered so far is politically correct, anti-religious expression interpretations of the Constitution. So I'm sorry to say that so far I have wondered if FR is a bunch high schoolers. And I'm sure that everybody is likewise wondering what grade school I attend.
I used to reference the Reynolds opinion in conjunction with the Everson opinion since both opinions completely ignore the 10th Amendment. But Reynolds has no reference to the 10th Amendment protected power of the states probably because Utah wasn't a state at the time.
Also, consider that in Justice Black's fervor to use Jefferson's words to help justify Black's treasonous interpretation of the establishment clause, Black seems to have overlooked that Jefferson never stressed, to my knowledge, a connection between the establishment clause and the "wall of separation".
"In the words of Jefferson, the clause against establishment of religion by law was intended to erect 'a wall of separation between Church and State.' Reynolds v. United States, supra, 98 U.S. at page 164." --Everson v. Board of Education of Ewing TP. 1947. http://tinyurl.com/8q3d8
Again, contrary to Justice Black's "profound insight" into Jefferson's "wall of separation" and the establishment clause, we've got two historical extracts where Jefferson acknowledges the unique, 10th A. protected power of the states to address religious issues.
The problem, in my "humble" opinion, is that the people are ignorant of both the Constitution and how their government is supposed to work.
http://tinyurl.com/npt6t
http://tinyurl.com/hehr8
As a consequence of widespread constitutional and government ignorance, anti-religious expression judges are walking all over our religious freedoms. After all, when was the last time that you heard of a judge who took the 10th A. powers of the states to address religious issues into consideration before booting Intelligent Design out of the school building? Indeed, judges who want to protect our religious freedoms may be unaware that Jefferson acknowledged the 10th A. protected powers of the states to address religious issues.
The bottom line is that the people need to get a grip on what the honest interpretations of the 1st, 10th and 14th Amendments actually say about our religious freedoms. Then, when the people wise up to the fact that they are essentially prisoners of conscious to the bogus interpretation of the establishment clause by a renegade, anti-religious expression Supreme Court, they will hopefully heed Lincoln's advice for dealing with crooked judges:
"We the People are the rightful master of both congress and the courts - not to overthrow the Constitution, but to overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution." --Abraham Lincoln, Political debates between Lincoln and Douglas, 1858.
*Bump* for later reading
You don't have to leave, honest. You do have to get a tough skin to hang around here though.
I don't understand what you mean by an amendment that states what my goals are.
Also, you have evidently chosen to ignore, and I've seen this many times before, that regardless what Justice Black wanted everybody to think about Jefferson's "wall of separation" that Jefferson had actually acknowledged that the Founders wrote the 1st and 10th Amendments in part to delegate government power to legislate religion uniquely to the state governments. But this is not surprising if you are aware that the states had this power long before they established the federal government and its Constitution.
As I've stated elsewhere, the people need to get a grip on what the honest interpretations of the 1st, 10th and 14th Amendments actually say about their religious freedoms. Then, when the people wise up to the fact that they are essentially prisoners of conscious to bogus interpretation of the establishment clause by a renegade, anti-religious expression Supreme Court, they will hopefully heed Lincoln's advice for dealing with crooked judges:
"We the People are the rightful master of both congress and the courts - not to overthrow the Constitution, but to overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution." --Abraham Lincoln, Political debates between Lincoln and Douglas, 1858.
Article 52.
(1) Citizens of the USSR are guaranteed freedom of conscience, that is, the right to profess or not to profess any religion, and to conduct religious worship or atheistic propaganda. Incitement of hostility or hatred on religious grounds is prohibited.(2) In the USSR, the church is separated from the state, and the school from the church.
I don't know how long you lurked on FR before signing up yesterday, but surely you realize that this forum is not noted for political correctness, and while we have our share of non-religious atheists, we have damn few folks who are actively anti-religious.
As to the level of intellectual sophistication here, my observation is that it runs the gamut from profoundly wise to profoundly stupid, often within the same thread. That's one of the things that keeps us cranking here -- there's something for everybody. We try to avoid personal attacks, so it's not likely you'll get called out for being in grade school. ;-)
Which is to say, this is a conservative forum, but don't expect folks here to necessarily agree with you. This is not an echo chamber like DU (most of the time, anyway).
FR does not length-limit, to my knowledge -- I've seen pages and pages of material included in individual comments, as well as very lengthy posts, as long as the source doesn't require severe excerpting (in which case that's not FR's doing). So unless you're trying to include the NYC phone book, I think you'll do okay. Granted, there might be tricks to accomplishing those long posts that aren't obvious; I don't think I've stressed the system myself before so I haven't run into a problem and had to solve it.
That was ACLU v Mercer in the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals. And yes the ACLU lost - big time. In addition, in its decision the Court derided and insulted the ACLU probably as much as legally ethical (unlike that Moonbat in Mich). It was a major smackdown. Anyway here is the salient part of the decision.
The ACLU’s argument contains three fundamental flaws. First, the ACLU makes repeated reference to “the separation of church and state.” This extra-constitutional construct has grown tiresome. The First Amendment does not demand a wall of separation between church and state.IMO this was s a HUGH victory for the good guys. The problem was that this decision came down right before Christmas on Dec 20, 2005. And at that time 'we' were all caught up in the 'War on Christmas', so this got little attention.
ACLU v Mercer County, Ky (NOTE its PDF)
And excuse the interruption :-)
The Constitution makes no reference to a deity or Christ--it says "We the people..." not anything about 'divine law'.
The notion that religion can be established by states is just nuts. Could Texas become an officially Baptist state or Connecticut an officially Catholic state? The idea is ludicrous. The right to freedom of religious conscience and governments on all levels that are neutral about religion is fundamental to Americanism, and cannot be decided by priests or preachers who manage to capture the power of government depending on which state you live it.
Thanks for the reminder - I'd forgotten the name of the case - and I agree it was a HUGE smackdown for the ACLU. Is the 6th Circuit the one which will hear the appeal of that Michigan moonbat judge's decision on the NSA terrorist wiretapping case?
Actually YES. The 6th covers MI, OH, KY TN.
So given the 6th's general 'disdain' for the ACLU's antics this may not even go to SCOTUS.
I have the Mercer case bookmarked. Sometimes when I feel down I go back and read it to cheer me up :-)
I just re-read it thanks to the link you provided. I really like the part where the court essentially says the ACLU isn't the "reasonable person" used as a standard and is, basically, an "eggshell plaintiff." BWAHAHAHA! Love it.
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