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To: Cboldt
The reason the Courts are unaccountable is because the legislature, which has the power of impeachment

That is not how the power of impeachment was understood at the time of ratification.

Antifederalist 78:

The only clause in the constitution which provides for the removal of the judges from offices, is that which declares, that "the president, vice- president, and all civil officers of the United States, shall be removed from office, on impeachment for, and conviction of treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors." By this paragraph, civil officers, in which the judges are included, are removable only for crimes. Treason and bribery are named, and the rest are included under the general terms of high crimes and misdemeanors. Errors in judgment, or want of capacity to discharge the duties of the office, can never be supposed to be included in these words, high crimes and misdemeanors. A man may mistake a case in giving judgment, or manifest that he is incompetent to the discharge of the duties of a judge, and yet give no evidence of corruption or want of integrity. To support the charge, it will be necessary to give in evidence some facts that will show, that the judges committed the error from wicked and corrupt motives.

Antifederalist 80:

The real effect of this system of government, will therefore be brought home to the feelings of the people, through the medium of the judicial power. It is, moreover, of great importance, to examine with care the nature and extent of the judicial power, because those who are to be vested with it, are to be placed in a situation altogether unprecedented in a free country. They are to be rendered totally independent, both of the people and the legislature, both with respect to their offices and salaries. No errors they may commit can be corrected by any power above them, if any such power there be, nor can they be removed from office for making ever so many erroneous adjudications.

The only causes for which they can be displaced, is, conviction of treason, bribery, and high crimes and misdemeanors....

When the courts will have a precedent before them of a court which extended its jurisdiction in opposition to an act of the legislature, is it not to be expected that they will extend theirs, especially when there is nothing in the constitution expressly against it? And they are authorised to construe its meaning, and are not under any control.

This power in the judicial, will enable them to mould the government, into any shape they please.

If you stretch the causes of impeachment to include judicial decisions with which you disagree, then impeachment becomes a political farce.

36 posted on 10/16/2009 9:22:11 AM PDT by Huck ("He that lives on hope will die fasting"- Ben Franklin, Poor Richard's Almanac)
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To: Huck
-- If you stretch the causes of impeachment to include judicial decisions with which you disagree, then impeachment becomes a political farce. --

That depends on the basis for the disagreement.

Plus, I don't see an impeachment farce as any worse than a constitutional farce, where, e.g., every federal law is withing the limited powers granted by the constitution because everything has some relation to commerce.

If a judge make a pronouncement of law based on pure fiction (e.g., "Miller was convicted, we upheld the law"), that's a farce too. If all three branches o along with it, the people don't have a remedy in the constitution.

I appreciate that Congress does not want to impeach, because then IT would be accountable. Plus, as I noted above, Congress LIKES for the Courts to give force to unconstitutional Congressional enactments. They like being empowered, even if the empowerment is illegitimate under the constitution.

40 posted on 10/16/2009 9:30:12 AM PDT by Cboldt
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