Posted on 06/24/2009 6:34:53 AM PDT by anniegetyourgun
WASHINGTON — Senate Republicans on Tuesday unveiled a new narrative ahead of Sonia Sotomayor's confirmation hearings, questioning her commitment to constitutional guarantees on the right to keep and bear arms and equal treatment under the law regardless of race or gender.
The senior Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee even questioned whether Sotomayor sufficiently opposes terrorism, citing what he said was the "extensive work" she had done for a group formerly named the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund.
"This is a group that has taken some very shocking positions with respect to terrorism," Sen. Jeff Sessions of Alabama said.
(Excerpt) Read more at islandpacket.com ...
Yeah, that’s a ‘tack’,Laurie.What a ridiculous, partisan thing to ask a Supreme Court nominee.
No, she hates everything the original intent of the Constitution stands for. She will turn it upside down every chance she gets....stupid question, next.
There is no constitutional right to equal treatment based on "gender".
She’d be the first. At any level of Federal government.
Only if it’s hanging from a dispenser in the ladies room.
“Original intent” is antithetical to liberal ideology.
Liberals believe that they, through benefit of living NOW, are indeed smarter than those who originally wrote the contract called the Constitution.
Almost certainly not.
I’ll just ditto all the nay’s here.
In a word. NO!
Yes there is.
The 14th Amendment’s usage of the word “person” covers it quite nicely, which is why the “ERA” was wholly unnecessary.
Unless, of course, one is a member of some bizarre religious sect that does not consider women to be persons.
Still, "half a loaf is better than no bread." I don't actually think that their whining at this late date is going to change much, but at least they are showing a semblance of a spine.
she hasnt bothered to read it, why uphold it?
Sorry my FRiend, but the ORIGINAL INTENT of the 14th amendment was to prohibit discrimination by virtue of race, not gender. If, in fact, the 14th amendment was intended to prohibit all discrimination based on gender, then women would have been drafted and forced to serve in combat. Further if the 14th amendment was originally intended to prohibit discrimination based on "gender" then women would have had the right to vote and the 19th Amendment would have been wholly unnecessary.
The ERA was not passed because it would have required women to be drafted and placed in combat roles in the military.
Gender discrimination is not a constitutionally prohibited practice. It never has been.
Now are you one of these people that believes in a living-breathing and changing-with-the-times Constitution?
How dare the GOP ask this!
(sarcasm)
Took some of that citrusy tasting liquid stuff prior to a medical test and it cleaned by constitution's riflings.
Fire-Breathing constitution..... :>)
Raise your hand if you trust Senate Republicans to uphold the Constitution.
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Just as I expected.
No. I am not “one of these people” who believes in a living, breathing Constitution; but I am “one of these people” who think a person is a person; and who also thinks the WORDS in he Constitution mean what the WORDS say. It does not matter what you or anyone else THINKS the “original intent” of the 14th was; all that matters is what the words say; just like with the 2nd Amendment.
Now are YOU one of those people who believe that if a right is not actually specifically spelled out in the Constitution that said right does not exist? I’m not. I approach it from the “other side”; the side that respects individual rights and individual self-determination.
I’m “one of these people” who think that unless a POWER is specifically spelled out in the Constitution that the government does not possess said power.
...questioning her commitment to constitutional guarantees on the right to keep and bear arms and equal treatment under the law regardless of race or gender.**** There is no constitutional right to equal treatment based on "gender". ****
You're right.
But I think what they're getting at are her comments about 'a wise Latina Woman' and Barry's unconstitutional ('I Feel Your Pain') 'empathy requirement' when deciding cases on 'the poor', the 'disadvantaged' and 'single mothers', in spite of what the Law or Constitution says.
That IMO is what the 'gender' reference is about.
Actually you are. You don't recognize it, but you are. I will prove it from your next statement:
It does not matter what you or anyone else THINKS the “original intent” of the 14th was; all that matters is what the words say; just like with the 2nd Amendment.
Words in and of themselves change meaning over time. So it is imperative that the intent of the Founders be ascertained in order to determine the meaning of the words in the context in which they were written.
I don't think anyone can legitimately argue that the 14th amendment was intentionally designed to give women the same rights or obligations as men, such as the right to vote or the duty to serve in the military under compulsion.
While the words are primary, their meaning can only be ascertained in the context of what they were intended to mean at the time the constitution was drafted. To intepret the constitution in such a manner as to grant rights where none were actually intended, is to accept the idea of a living breathing constitution.
Now as to your argument regarding the 2nd amendment, if you look merely at the words themselves, without reference to what the framers intended, then the right to bear arms would be limited to militia (which in modern terminology means police and military).
****if you look merely at the words themselves, without reference to what the framers intended, then the right to bear arms would be limited to militia (which in modern terminology means police and military).****
Not necessarily...although I tend to agree with you. It really depends on the final section about "the right of the people..."
That's really, really hard to ignore no matter the interpretation of the first 2 clauses.
No. You are dead wrong about our Constitution. You have it backwards. The Constitution does not GRANT rights to the people, it grants POWERS (and limited powers at that) to the federal government of the United States of America.
The Constitution is a contract between the People and our government in which the very limited powers of our government are listed. A government exercising its powers ALWAYS infringes on the absolute rights of the people. Our Constitution simply enumerates the areas in which the rights of the people may be infringed by the government in order to maintain a society. If a POWER (permission to infringe at some level on some individual right) was not specifically granted to the federal government in the Constitution then it does not exist.
You are also dead wrong about me being a person who believes in a "living, breathing" constitution and your "proof" makes no sense. I fully understand that some words change meaning over the course of time. There is a simple solution to that issue. The constitution and its amendments should be interpreted based what the words used in meant at the time it, and its subsequent amendments, were adopted (such meanings are very easy to find by simply referring to a dictionary from the period in question). And that is certainly a better method, and a method more true to the founders' original document, than some modern-day judge pretending that they can discern the"intent" of people who lived 150-230 years ago and who may or may not have ever published or wrote anything to shed actual light on their “intent”.
I give our founders the benefit of the doubt in assuming that they wrote what they meant and meant what they wrote when they drafted and adopted the document and its amendments. And by the way, the meaning of the word “person” has not changed since 1865.
RE: Your “interpretation” of the Second Amendment to the Constitution. I know the difference between a dependent clause and an independent clause, and I assume our founding fathers knew it as well.
Taking your interpretation (which in that sense is correct), the federal government has no power whatsoever to give money to or to sponsor PBS or any other information or educational or entertainment entity. But you are not arguing against PBS existing, you are arguing here for the idea that as long as they exist, they should not be allowed to broadcast religious points of view.
Your constitutional analysis is inconsistent, if not downright hypocritical.
The right of the people to both the free expression of religion and the free exercise of religion is guaranteed under the first amendment. The Federal Government has exceeded its Constitutional power in subsidizing PBS and they are compounding the problem by dictating content restrictions and forcing those stations to broadcast ONLY so-called "secular" points of view.
That is a clear violation of the first amendment. But you seem to be in favor of both the violation of the enumerated Powers clauses as well as the violation of the free speech clause.
Sorry, that last post was for someone else. :-)
Larry Pratt from Gun Owners of America told the rats, 27 of whom voted for concealed carry in the national parks, that if they vote for Sotomayor’s confirmation, then it will cancel prior pro Second Amendment votes that they already had cast.
Thanks neverdem.
You're certainly 100% correct about THAT!
...and Larry is right!
I wonder if any of the 27 will heed his words and act accordingly. I doubt it; but we can always “hope” they “change” their partisan, lap-dog, ways vis-a-vis ratifying the Obamessiah’s dreadful political appointees..
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