Free Republic

Saying it “stands firmly” in support of legalized abortion, a Washington, D.C. restaurant has canceled a pro-life group’s booking for its annual “March for Life Breakfast.”The group, Democrats for Life of America, scheduled the event at the K Street location of Busboys and Poets, a restaurant-bookstore chain, to coincide with the 49th annual March for Life on Jan. 21. “When our team learned the fundraising nature of the event in question, the decision was made to cancel it and refund all deposits to the event organizer,” a spokeswoman for Busboys and Poets told CNA. The chain “stands firmly on the...

The U.S. Supreme Court just left in place New York’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate for healthcare workers that allows for no religious exemptions. On Monday, the nation’s highest court rejected, by a 6-3 vote, a request by 20 anonymous doctors and nurses, nearly all of whom are Catholic, to grant an injunction against the arguably unlawful mandate. Only Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, and Neil Gorsuch voted to grant the injunction. Typical of emergency injunction cases, none of the judges in the majority provided an explanation for their vote, but Gorsuch, joined by Alito, took them to task in a 14-page...

section class="post-body"> The US Supreme Court handed down a long-anticipated decision called Whole Woman’s Health vs. Jackson this morning.By way of background, on September 1, S.B. 8, the so-called “heartbeat bill” went into effect in Texas. The law had some unique features. First and foremost, it outlawed abortion after the point of a detectable fetal heartbeat. This was a clear challenge to the whole inhumane sham structure of abortion jurisprudence brought into existence by Roe vs. Wade. However, the most interesting feature was creating a private right to action to enforce the law. That means anyone can bring a lawsuit...

For the first time in a generation, there are six conservative justices on the Supreme Court. In time, this sextet will incrementally push the Court to the right. Yet, three of them are already sounding an alarm. Twice this term, Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch warned that Justices Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett lack backbone. In an excessive force case, the conservative trio wrote that the two newest Justices were "unwilling to...bear[] the criticism that" denying the prisoner's appeal "would inevitably elicit." And in a religious liberty case, the Thomas-3 charged that Kavanaugh and Barrett lacked...

The Supreme Court split 5-4 on the case Thursday, with Justices Neil Gorsuch Clarence Thomas splitting off from other conservative members of the bench.WASHINGTON (CN) — A convicted felon whose priors included one instance of reckless aggravated assault should not have been given an enhanced sentence after he was later caught with a handgun, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 5-4 Thursday.“The treatment of reckless offenses as ‘violent felonies’ would impose large sentencing enhancements on individuals (for example, reckless drivers) far afield from the ‘armed career criminals’ ACCA addresses — the kind of offenders who, when armed, could well ‘use [the]...

The Supreme Court on Tuesday shut down an attempt to treat the testimony of asylum-seekers as credible, siding with the federal government against people seeking refuge in the country. The court unanimously found that a previous ruling from the California-based U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit had incorrectly ruled that in immigration cases, noncitizens' testimonies must be treated as credible or true. The court vacated the 9th Circuit's decision and sent it back to lower courts for further consideration... ...In both cases, Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote, the 9th Circuit was wrong to interfere because of a technical question....

In 2019, the California Court of Appeal, 1st Appellate District, ruled that a police offer may always enter a suspect's home without a warrant if the officer is in pursuit of the suspect and has probable cause to believe that the suspect has committed a misdemeanor. This week, the U.S. Supreme Court considered whether that ruling should be overturned.Justice Neil Gorsuch seemed to have a problem with the lower court's decision. Under the common law, Gorsuch pointed out during oral arguments in Lange v. California, the police did not "have the power to enter the home in pursuit of any...

Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) said the two Trump-appointed conservative Supreme Court justices “will pay the price” for “awful decisions” in abortion rights cases. Schumer addressed justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh in front of a crowd at the Supreme Court and appeared to threaten Senate Republicans and the administration if the court voted in favor of the Louisiana abortion law that could result in the court revisiting the protections provided in the Roe v. Wade ruling. “I want to tell you, Justice Kavanaugh and Justice Gorsuch, you have unleashed a whirlwind, and you will pay the price,” Schumer...

Regarding the Texas lawsuit against PA,WI, MI and GA there has been much speculation that AJs Alito and Thomas will provide solid support, but Kavanaugh and Gorsuch may waiver. Their opinions supporting denial of the stay of a lower court order blocking efforts to extend the deadline for mail in ballot returns in Wisconsin are very illuminating and show that they, in particular are steadfast patriots. In the opinions supporting denial of a stay of the lower court order Gorsuch [joined by Kavanugh] makes his views clear. Here is what AJ Gorsuch wrote in part: The Constitution provides that state...

Conservative lawmakers blasted Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts after he sided with the court's liberal justices in a 5-4 decision Friday that rejected a Nevada church’s request to block the state government from enforcing a cap on attendance at religious services. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) tweeted early Saturday morning that Roberts had "abandoned his oath." "What happened to that judge?" tweeted Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.). "Freedom of religion is our first freedom. Yet SCOTUS has ruled that casinos can host hundreds of gamblers, while churches cannot welcome their full congregations. Justice Roberts once again got it wrong, shamefully closing...

When Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch redefined “sex” in federal law, twisting federal bans on sex discrimination to include discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and transgender identity, his colleague Samuel Alito rightly warned that the decision would wreak havoc on the health care industry. Almost exactly one month later, the ACLU filed a lawsuit to force a Roman Catholic hospital to perform transgender surgery in violation of the Hippocratic Oath, citing none other than Gorsuch’s opinion. In Hammons v. University of Maryland Medical System (UMMS), a biological female who identifies as a transgender man, Jesse Hammons, claims St....

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Thursday ruled by a 5-4 margin that nearly half of Oklahoma is an Indian reservation in the eyes of the criminal-justice system, preventing state authorities from prosecuting offenses there that involve Native Americans. The decision was potentially one of the most consequential legal victories for Native Americans in decades. It was written by Justice Neil Gorsuch, a Westerner who has sided with tribes in previous cases and joined the court’s more liberal members.

A commonplace assumption of American liberalism, that courts merely preside over contests of rights, conceals the judiciary’s limitless power to decide questions of truth without thinking deeply or even honestly about them. Bostock v. Clayton County is a case in point. The ruling holds that sexual orientation and “identity” are included in the definition of “sex” under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Writing for the majority, Justice Neil Gorsuch claims it is a narrow ruling about sex discrimination in employment, leaving concerns like locker rooms and religious liberty for future litigation. Underneath this false modesty lies...

Tennis legend Martina Navratilova, the winner of 18 Grand Slam singles titles, has noted that, when it comes to competitive athletics, “sex segregation is the only way to achieve equality for girls and women.” That is because, on average, males are stronger, faster, and more powerful than females. And, yet, with the stroke of a pen, the United States Supreme Court last week called into question the legality of all sex-specific athletic teams. ... Many civil rights activists cheered the holding as a victory for the LGBTQ+ community. And, indeed, it is. ... Suppose, for example, a male student fails...

The ruling will lead to a tsunami of polarizing court cases and further degradation of Americans' natural rights to free speech, to free association, and to worshipping God as their consciences require... ruling inserting “gender identity” into the word “sex” in a 1964 employment law, the U.S. Supreme Court called a man a woman, possibly leading to eventually forcing everyone else to do so also. The ruling will lead to a tsunami of polarizing court cases and further degradation of Americans’ natural rights to free speech, to free association, and to worshipping God as their consciences require. All this in...

Et tu, Gorsuch? A little over three years into a lifetime appointment, and he's already speaking for Justice Ginsburg when it comes to matters of transsexualism and forgotten all about Justice Scalia's textualism. No matter how hard we try, our "conservative" judges belly-flop into "strict constructionist" poseurs and weak-kneed judicial activists faster than Chief Justice Roberts can rewrite Obamacare into a tax. I mean, you try to keep these "originalist" jurists on a philosophically sound path. You teach them "right" from "wrong." You instill in them a respect for the law and the importance of always telling the truth. You...

Today, Yoram Hozany, an Israeli philosopher, tweeted: I wonder: Has there ever been an ideological movement this incompetent? They only had one job to do: Distinguish conservative lawyers from liberal lawyers. They formulate lists of approved individuals and everyone murmurs that they’ve been vetted. Then all sorts of distinguished persons publicly pronounce in chorus that the candidate is brilliant and the nomination fine. What criteria are involved in all this? I understand his disgust. Democrats bat 1.000 when it comes to nominating reliable left-liberals to the Supreme Court. Republicans bat around .500 in nominating reliable conservatives. But it’s not as...

The Supreme Court ruled Monday that a landmark civil rights law protects gay and transgender workers from workplace discrimination, handing the movement for L.G.B.T. equality a stunning victory. The vote was 6 to 3, with Justice Neil M. Gorsuch writing the majority opinion. He was joined by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen G. Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan. The case concerned Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which bars employment discrimination based on race, religion, national origin and sex. The question for the justices was whether that last prohibition...

What we need is a more forceful conservative legal movement, just as willing as the left to make moral arguments in court, based on principles of justice, natural law (the rules embedded in our very nature as human beings), the common good and the religious and moral traditions underlying Anglo-American constitutional order.

On Monday, the Supreme Court concluded that homosexuality and transgenderism are covered under the Civil Rights Act of 1964. This post doesn’t have enough space to explain why, legally, that is an incorrect decision. Put simply, the Civil Rights Act does not cover sexual orientation and was never intended to. If Congress wants to change that, it can; it is not the Supreme Court’s role, though, to make that change. This post focuses only on the fact that the Supreme Court, in Bostock v. Clayton County, wrongly accepted the premise that transgenderism is part of the homosexuality spectrum. It...