Free Republic

IT TAKES AN INSURRECTION TO change a country. It takes an establishment to govern one. Conservatives want both to change and to govern America. Thus we need our dissatisfied, troublemaking, occasionally splenetic, sometimes raffish anti-establishmentarians. After all, without brave resistance and bold insurrection on the part of conservatives, liberal orthodoxy and institutions would still dominate American life. But insurrection isn't enough. At some point, the radicals need assistance, support, and reinforcement from establishment conservatives--individuals ill-suited to insurrection but well-suited to rising through the institutions and moving them gradually but meaningfully in a conservative direction. Thus, we need our sober, calm,...

The Republicans' ideal Supreme Court nominee is someone who might overturn Roe v. Wade, but won't. That makes President Bush's choice of John G. Roberts pure genius. If defenders of abortion rights condemn the pick, so much the better. Social conservatives will think they won. And when a court ruling later proves they haven't, Republican leaders can comfort them. So far, all is according to plan. Roe v. Wade is the 1973 Supreme Court decision enshrining a federal right to abortion. If Roe went down, two bad things would happen to Republicans. One is that it would arouse America's pro-choice...

Perhaps Sen. Charles Schumer should have taken the Quiet Car. Here’s what the New York Democrat reportedly was overheard saying the other day on Amtrak: “Even William Rehnquist is more moderate than they expected. The only one that resulted how they predicted [was] Scalia. So most of the time they’ve gotten their picks wrong, and that’s what we want to do to them again.” Whether or not this quote from the Drudge Report is accurate, the sentiment is correct: The litany of conservative disappointments over Supreme Court appointments is a long one. Earl Warren. Harry Blackmun. John Paul Stevens. Anthony...

President George W. Bush makes one of the most important decisions defining his legacy by uttering a name. If that name for Supreme Court justice is a constant conservative to the end of the life-time term, then the Bush presidency defines the start of an era. The momentum for change, like a glacier, will creak forward. Anything less, including a scheme of one conservative for two open seats means enough conservative Christians stay home, even if Hillary runs, and liberals win the 2008 election. The U.S. Culture War widens, deepens, and threatens because the judges will get worse. A conservative...

The Democrats' orgy over retiring Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor is just one fraudulent component of their grand con game in preparation for war over her successor. Oh, sure, they approve of O'Connor's steadfast protection of the Court's pro-abortion precedent. And they appreciate other positions she took in furtherance of their policy agenda, but she's hardly their ideal jurist. After all, she sided with the majority in "selecting" George W. Bush president. Their recent, unified celebration of O'Connor is part of their cynical calculation to position themselves as mainstream and Republicans as extremists. They see this as an essential...

Drama Expected Monday In U.S. Supreme Court POSTED: 6:57 am CDT June 26, 2005 UPDATED: 9:54 pm CDT June 26, 2005 WASHINGTON -- President George W. Bush is preparing for what could be his first Supreme Court vacancy.With the High Court term due to end Monday and 80-year-old Chief Justice William Rehnquist battling cancer, speculation is rife he'll announce his retirement. Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist. If he does, spokesman Scott McClellan said the president will be ready. He said officials have "prepared for that scenario" -- as any White House would.Last week, Senate Democrats sent a letter...

For 200 years the Senate carefully considered the professional track record of any judge nominated for the federal bench. That changed five years ago when ranking Democrats decided to turn the Senate Judiciary Committee into their own personal meat grinder. Despite having nearly 100 federal judgeships to fill, these Democrats resolved to torpedo most of President Bush's nominations. This partisan blood oath – as opposed to careful consideration of each jurist's record – now decides who presides over our federal courts. At least one major implication is that the dearth of federal judges (one-eighth of all federal judgeships still remain...

Four years ago today, President George W. Bush nominated Priscilla Owen to serve on the federal court of appeals. Justice Owen is an extraordinary Texan, an exceptional jurist, and a devoted public servant. Yet, after four years, she is still waiting for an up-or-down vote in the United States Senate. What's more, a partisan minority of senators now demands — for the first time in history — that she must be supported by a supermajority of 60 senators, rather than the constitutional rule and Senate tradition of majority vote. After four years, it is long past time to restore sanity...

He wasn't President Reagan's first choice for the U.S. Supreme Court - or his second choice for that matter - and plenty of conservatives have never let him forget it. Seventeen years and a handful of decisions later, Justice Anthony Kennedy - a conservative by background but a swing vote on social issues - has become the poster boy, on the part of those calling for President Bush's most controversial judicial nominees to confirmed by the U.S. Senate, for why the president should get to install judges he really wants rather than capitulate to liberals and moderates. Pressure on Republicans...

SANTA MARIA, Calif. (Reuters) - The judge in the Michael Jackson molestation trial on Thursday barred prosecutors from calling an expert on domestic violence they hoped would explain the apparently erratic behavior of the accuser's mother for jurors. Judge Rodney Melville also said he would allow evidence showing that Jackson's then-13-year-old accuser and younger brother had masturbated while looking at the pop star's pornography, potentially bolstering defense claims that the boys had run wild at Neverland. Both rulings were setbacks for the prosecution, which is in the final stages of presenting its case to the jury of eight women and...

When Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore refused a federal court order to remove a monument to the Ten Commandments from that state’s Supreme Court building, he became the central figure in a firestorm of criticism from the left. But his liberal critics weren’t alone. Conservatives also chided Moore, contending that his defiance of the order undermined the “rule of law” in America. Throughout history, the law has served several functions. In a free and morally upright society, it provides a framework within which the people can safely live their lives and pursue their dreams. In a dictatorship, however, it devolves...

For those who look closely, signs of desperation on the part of liberal Democrats are everywhere. I am not sure when they finally came to the realization people are figuring out what they are really about, but they know it's happening. And they are afraid of the truth more than anything. They are so afraid they will say and do anything to blur reality so the average person won't know their positions are baseless. For instance, Rep. John T. Salazar, D-Colo., said last week: "Creating private accounts will only hasten the demise of Social Security, by draining trillions of dollars...

WASHINGTON (AP) - The Supreme Court's history on right-to-die cases is pretty thin. It ruled in 1990 that a terminally ill person has a right to refuse life-sustaining treatment. And next term it plans to consider whether the federal government can prosecute doctors who help ill patients die. Between those cases, the court has not said much, choosing to allow states to decide the issue. Terri Schiavo's case offers a number of legal questions for the court to consider if, as expected, it reaches the justices. Among them is whether she actually requested that artificial means not be used to...

What a tough week it was for the oft-divided justices of the United States Supreme Court. Two paramount decisions handed down last week ticked off great numbers of Americans. And another ruling had both sides of the same issue declaring total victory. The dizzying amount of feedback, political rhetoric and media attention given to each of their cases makes it entirely plausible that one or more of these "robed ones" may indeed wish to step down and call it quits sooner rather than later. As far as affirmative action went, no one in America was at all satisfied with the...

What Conservative Court? By Bobby Eberle June 30, 2003 There has been a longstanding charge by liberals, both in government and the media, that the United States Supreme Court is too conservative. This belief has led to scare tactics by Democrat legislators and pundits that President Bush's mission is to stack the entire court system with even more of the dreaded conservative judges. There are many who believe that efforts by Democrats to filibuster judicial nominees such as Miguel Estrada and Priscilla Owen are done merely to set the stage for when a vacancy opens up on the Supreme Court....

<p>WASHINGTON - The U.S. Supreme Court, both hailed and cursed for its tough positions on matters involving people accused or convicted of crimes, issued a mixed set of rulings Monday on the rights of criminals.</p> <p>The court gave the go-ahead to laws that would curtail visits to prison inmates and restrict public access to housing projects to keep criminals out. But it also instituted new limits on prosecutors who seek to force anti-psychotic drugs on mentally ill defendants.</p>

Court Disallows Executing Retarded Thu Jun 20,10:37 AM ET WASHINGTON (AP) - A divided Supreme Court reversed itself Thursday and ruled that executing the mentally retarded is unconstitutionally cruel. The 6-3 ruling is confined to mentally retarded killers, and does not address the constitutionality of capital punishment in general. The majority's view reflects changes in public attitudes on the issue since the court declared such executions constitutional in 1989. Then, only two states that used capital punishment outlawed the practice for the retarded. Now, 18 states prohibit it. "It is not so much the number of these states that is...