Free Republic

SACRAMENTO (AP) - A federal judge on Wednesday set the stage for an atheist and three Sacramento-area school districts to take their dispute over the Pledge of Allegiance to an appeals court. U.S. District Court Judge Lawrence Karlton said he will stay a ruling made last month, meaning the schools can continue having children recite the pledge. In his previous finding, Karlton said he was bound by a 2002 ruling of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which ruled that the pledge is unconstitutional when recited in public schools because it contains the words "under God." That lawsuit was...

NEW YORK (AP) - A federal judge upheld three lawsuits Friday accusing Jordan-based Arab Bank of promoting Palestinian suicide attacks by funneling Saudi money to bombers' families. U.S. District Judge Nina Gershon denied six of eight counts in Arab Bank's March motion to dismiss the litigation, allowing bombing survivors and victims' families to move forward with their lawsuits seeking hundreds of millions of dollars in damages. The lawsuits claim that Arab Bank aided terrorism by acting as the administrator of an "insurance plan" by the Saudi Committee in Support of the Intifada Al Quds, which paid $5,300 to the families...

Just heard on Fox....so sad.

News Alert:On January 13, a federal judge in Georgia ruled that stickers placed in textbooks of an Atlanta area school district saying “Evolution is a theory, not a fact” are unconstitutional! ( View sticker.) According to this judge, such criticisms of evolution are an endorsement of religion. The judge’s action is the latest example of the nationwide effort to ban any critical analysis of the theory of evolution and insist that evolution be taught as the only option! The Action:The Center for Reclaiming America has launched a national petition to rally 100,000 citizens immediately to oppose this federal court...

LOS ANGELES (AP) - A federal judge has allowed the county to continue with its plans to close the trauma center at Martin Luther King Jr./Drew Medical Center by denying a temporary restraining order sought by doctors and residents. The motion by Friends of King/Drew argued that the court needed to intervene immediately so community members would not be deprived of emergency medical services. The court filing rejected Thursday is part of a civil rights lawsuit alleging that closing the trauma unit would have a disproportionate affect South Los Angeles residents. Health department officials have said they need to close...

A federal judge ruled Wednesday that terror suspects held in Cuba must be allowed to meet with lawyers, and that the government cannot monitor their conversations. In a sharp rebuke of the Bush administration, U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly said the administration "attempts to erode this bedrock principle" of attorney-client privacy with "a flimsy assemblage" of arguments. The Supreme Court ruled in June that the 600 foreign-born men then held in the Navy-run prison camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, could challenge their captivity in American courts.

A federal judge threatened to put the state's prison system into receivership after warning that a prison guard contract renegotiated by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger harms reform efforts in the nation's largest state correctional system. The California Correctional Peace Officers Association, the guard's union, already has a pattern of interfering with investigations and employee discipline, U.S. District Judge Thelton E. Henderson wrote Monday in a letter received Tuesday by Schwarzenegger. Schwarzenegger's proposal would worsen problems by granting even more concessions to the union in return for postponing pay increases, despite numerous warnings from a federal court special master, witnesses at Senate...

CINCINNATI -- Richland County Common Pleas Judge James DeWeese's fight to return the Ten Commandments to his courtroom wall suffered a setback Wednesday. The United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth District's three-judge panel ruled 2-1 that displaying the plaque violates the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. "We're obviously pleased with the ruling," Gary Daniels, litigation coordinator for the American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio, said. A federal judge forced DeWeese to remove the Ten Commandments in 2002 after a lawsuit by the ACLU. "We've contended such a display is offensive to the Establishment Clause and violates the...

A federal judge in Kansas ruled a university's prominent display of a sculpture that mocks the Catholic faith did not violate the Constitution. Washburn University's sculpture, entitled "Holier than Thou," depicts a Roman Catholic bishop with a grotesque facial expression wearing a miter that resembles a phallus. The Topeka school's Campus Beautification Committee selected the display to help fulfill its goal of having "one of the most beautiful campuses in Kansas." After refusing to act on complaints brought by numerous Catholics, including the archbishop of Kansas City, a lawsuit was filed by the Ann Arbor, Michigan-based Thomas More Law Center....

Carhart wins temporary victory BY BUTCH MABIN / Lincoln Journal Star Citing the health risks a late-term abortion law could pose to mothers, U.S. District Judge Richard G. Kopf on Wednesday temporarily barred the federal government from enforcing the measure against four doctors. In an order issued shortly after President Bush signed legislation that banned so-called partial-birth abortions, Kopf ruled the measure appeared to suffer the same constitutional flaw -- the absence of a health exception for the mother -- that the U.S. Supreme Court identified in a 1997 Nebraska measure. "While it is ... true that Congress found that...

The President signed the Partial Birth Abortion bill today and within an hour, a Nebraska Federal Judge according to Fox News had put a stay on the Partial Birth Abortion bill taking effect. ACLU is also shopping for a Manhatten Federal Judge to do the same.Since these liberal judges have taken this action, it is up to Freepers to take action. Please start writing letters and calling talk radio NOW. You can find the info for your area by visiting Bush-Cheney '04 at: Bush-Cheney '04 Activism Site Please post on this thread the action you have taken and notify all...

A Clashing of Principles and Jurisdictions David Limbaugh Friday, Aug. 22, 2003 While everyone is focusing on the propriety of Alabama Supreme Court Justice Roy Moore's refusal to remove a Ten Commandments monument from his courthouse, we are giving the federal courts a pass – and we mustn't. Undeniably, the federal constitution's Supremacy Clause makes the federal constitution and constitutional federal laws supreme over state constitutions and laws and binding on state judges. So, should our analysis end here? That's what some conservative pundits are saying. The federal courts have ordered Justice Moore to remove the monument under authority of...

Ruling lets Arizona inmates write to Web sites ACLU argued that ban violated right to free speech 12/18/2002 Associated Press PHOENIX - A federal judge ordered the Department of Corrections to stop enforcing a policy forbidding Arizona inmates from corresponding with, or appearing on, Web sites. U.S. District Judge Earl Carroll granted an injunction request by the American Civil Liberties Union to stop enforcement of the law, which is the subject of a pending lawsuit. "Putting free speech behind bars simply because it concerns prisoners sets a dangerous precedent," said Arizona ACLU attorney David Fathi. "The court's decision makes...

<p>"Judge Cudahy's apology is corrective action," Posner said in response to the request for an investigation made by the House Judiciary Committee chairman, Rep. James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., and Rep. Howard Coble, R-N.C.</p> <p>Posner and Cudahy are members of the Chicago-based U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals. Cudahy is also a member of the special division of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.</p>