Posted on 06/26/2008 8:44:48 PM PDT by Baron OBeef Dip
Actually, Chemerinsky IS a lawyer, a very liberal one.
Obama would probably nominate him to the Supreme Court.
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=ISO-8859-1&q=Erwin+Chemerinsky&btnG=Search
Chemerinsky is a simpering communist who couldn’t possibly have reasd the decision. He just gravitates to these kinds of stupid comments.
What a maroon!
Only an ultra-liberal could possibly view upholding the Second Ammendment of the Constitution as being "judicial activism".
These guys truly have no shame whatsoever.
Judicial activism is making up new rights in the Constitution that aren’t there. The 2nd Amendment ruling is about protecting a right that clearly is in the Constitution.
Time to Fight the Religious Right
by Erwin Chemerinsky|
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/erwin-chemerinsky/time-to-fight-the-religio_b_8048.html
“I believe that the greatest threat to liberty in the United States is posed by the religious right, largely comprised of Christian fundamentalists. Across a broad spectrum of issues they want to move the law in a radically more conservative direction, ultimately threatening our freedom.
This spring, I argued a case in the Supreme Court challenging a six-foot tall, three feet wide Ten Commandments monument that sits between the Texas State Capitol and the Texas Supreme Court.”
The anti-American, liberal chumps appear to be more than a little upset over today's ruling. Maggots like the "author" are finally getting a dose of what it feels like to be a conservative. Deal with it Erwin!
Never before had the Supreme Court found that the 2nd Amendment bestows on individuals a right to have guns. In fact, in 1939 (and other occasions), the court rejected this view.
I would consider that 1939 ruling an act of judicial activism. The author's Orwellian logic seems to go something like this: An act of judicial activism that is congenial to progressive thinking is not really judicial activism, in any meaningful sense of that term. To undo the original act of judicial activism--or whatever term one might prefer--would be true judicial activism.
Or something like that.
What percentage of the population of the United States, at the time of the ratification of the bill of Rights, did NOT possess arms? I ask concerning individual citizens.
I am going to guess that the percentage of individual Americans in 1787-1789 who did NOT possess arms would be too small a number to be considered significant.
And this garbage about trying to define the militia as something like any recent standing U.S. Army is ridiculous. The “militia” in 1787 to 1789 consisted of the common citizenry — an ARMED citizenry. Why, while the Constitution calls for a standing Navy, it does not call for a separate standing army. I believe the armed citizenry itself was to be taken for the nation’s army — the militia.
Only to an idiot or a liar. And I'm being very diplomatic.
I wonder if he was in the Group of 88?
No, his name was not on the list.
That’s the sort of liberal nonsense one can expect from the L.A. Times. I actually read Scalia’s opinion for the majority and it consists, among other things, of a rigid historical analysis of the original intent of the Founders and why they believed the Second Amendment applied to INDIVIDUALS and not to any “well regulated militia” as a separate corporate entity. To suggest that the Court is being “activist” by upholding a part of the Bill of Rights against assaults from groups that have partisan agendas to promote is just playing the usual convoluted word game that liberals love to play when they don’t like a Court decision. Besides, judicial activism is not interpreting the Constitution but legislating from the bench. Even the radical L.A. Times can’t rationally claim that. The majority cited stare decisis, historical context, and the words and intent of the Founders.
James Madison, of Virginia:
The Constitution preserves “the advantage of being armed which Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation. . . (where) the governments are afraid to trust the people with arms.” — The Federalist, No. 46
Thomas Jefferson, of Virginia:
“No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms.” — Proposed Virginia Constitution, 1776
“Laws that forbid the carrying of arms. . . disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes. . . Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man.” — Jefferson`s “Commonplace Book,” 1774-1776, quoting from On Crimes and Punishment, by criminologist Cesare Beccaria, 1764
Samuel Adams, of Massachusetts:
“The said Constitution [shall] be never construed to authorize Congress to infringe the just liberty of the press, or the rights of conscience; or to prevent the people of the United States, who are peaceable citizens, from keeping their own arms.” — Massachusetts` U.S. Constitution ratification convention, 1788
George Mason, of Virginia:
“[W]hen the resolution of enslaving America was formed in Great Britain, the British Parliament was advised by an artful man, who was governor of Pennsylvania, to disarm the people; that it was the best and most effectual way to enslave them; but that they should not do it openly, but weaken them, and let them sink gradually.”. . . I ask, who are the militia? They consist now of the whole people, except a few public officers.” — Virginia`s U.S. Constitution ratification convention, 1788
http://www.nraila.org/Issues/FactSheets/Read.aspx?ID=53
What a ridiculous statement.
...since when did reading the Constitution and doing what it says become “activism”?
And if it is “activism” why is it a bad thing?
Here’s today’s definition of a drooling moron:
Someone who believes that cases decided by activist judges over the most recent 70 or so years is untouchable holy writ...
...but...
...the case law of the prior 140 or so years, the text of the Constitution itself, the writings of the Founders, the facts of the Revolution, etc. are meaningless tripe.
Fact: the reversal of a series of errors that began a lifetime ago is NOT judicial activism, it is the restoration of the proper interpretation of the law. “Judicial Activism” can be defined as making up law out of whole cloth and claiming very vigorously that this result WOULD HAVE BEEN the Original Intent, if only the writers of the Constitution had been enlightened enough to figure out the issue at hand.
You shouldn't. The Miller ruling only happened the way it did because the defendant wasn't present so no case was presented on the defense side. The government side asserted that short-barreled shotguns had no militia role because they weren't a military weapon (in spite of the fact that they had been used in the first world war. The court couldn't consider this fact because it hadn't been presented; because no case at all had been presented by the defense, who weren't present).
All of Miller was based on a lie, but even so the ruling was limited in scope and misrepresented by future courts. The court never ruled in any way that the 2nd amendment was not an individual right; they just said that there was no evidence presented that sawed-off shotguns had a valid militia role.
In United States v. Verdugo-Urquidez, Chief Justice Rehnquist stated; "The Second Amendment protects "the right of the people to keep and bear Arms," and the Ninth and Tenth Amendments provide that certain rights and powers are retained by and reserved to "the people." See also U.S. Const., Amdt. 1, ("Congress shall make no law ... abridging ... the right of the people peaceably to assemble"); Art. I, s 2, cl. 1 ("The House of Representatives shall be composed of Members chosen every second Year by the People of the several States") (emphasis added). While this textual exegesis is by no means conclusive, it suggests that "the people" protected by the Fourth Amendment, and by the First and Second Amendments, and to whom rights and powers are reserved in the Ninth and Tenth Amendments, refers to a class of persons who are part of a national community or who have otherwise developed sufficient connection with this country to be considered part of that community. 110 S. Ct. at 1061. Since Verdugo-Urquidez is not part of "the people," he is not protected by the Fourth Amendments (nor, apparently, by the First, Second, Ninth, or Tenth).
"The Supreme Court therefore views the words "the people" in the Second Amendment to have the same meaning as in the First, Fourth, Ninth, and Tenth Amendments. If "the people" really meant the right of states to maintain a militia, then we would be left with the absurd notion that only the states have the right to peaceably assemble, only the states have the right to be secure in their persons and property, etc. The Supreme Court's position is indisputable: the Second Amendment protects the individual right to bear arms."
Chemerinksy, ironically, taught the Constitutional Law portion of Barbri’s bar review course I took last year. I just remember that he was whiny and a total nerd.
You’re absolutely correct. And if you’ll look into the history of England, the right to bear arms (AND FOR SELF-DEFENSE) is a very old one—one the colonists absolutely would have believed in.
One of the first acts of Parliament following the accession of William and Mary to the throne of England as a result of the Glorious Revolution of 1688 was to restore the old constitution with its provision that every man may arm for self-defense. Yes, with restrictions, but fundamental to this was the right to self-defense.
What Chimerinsky would have us believe is that the colonists and the founding fathers would actually limit the right to bear arms from what they had known in England after the British had attempted to seize their individual liberties and their weapons. The idea is wholly preposterous.
And I’ll note our dear Chimerinsky refers to these judges as advocates of “judicial restraint.” I’ll note that if he referred to them as what they are more commonly known as—orginalists—it wholly demolishes his argument and turns the arguments all against him.
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