Have you ever had a boss who treated you like a child, second-guessed you, reworked whatever you did so that you felt no ownership of the final product? As a result, did you take your job less and less seriously precisely because you knew that whatever you produced wouldn’t really be yours anyway?
Well, the Supreme Court is the boss, and Congress is the Dilbert. There was a time when the U.S. Congress took the Constitution very seriously. Even after Marbury v. Madison, the 1803 case that established the Supreme Court’s power of judicial review, Congress and the president were still the chief guardians of the Constitution. Indeed, before the Civil War, only two acts of Congress were found unconstitutional by the Supreme Court.
These days, the Court seems to find duly enacted laws unconstitutional six days a week and twice on Sunday.
Lawmakers rarely bother their pretty little heads with the Constitution. Rather, they just load as much spit, tar, Vaseline, and whatever else they can think of on a legislative fastball and try to get it over SCOTUS’ plate. If those imperial umpires don’t call a constitutional strike, well, then — voilá — it must be constitutional.
Presidents are no better. George W. Bush, in his one act that does approach an impeachable offense, signed campaign finance “reform” in 2002, even though he made it clear he thought the law was unconstitutional. At the ceremony, he expressed his “concerns” over the fact that the law — which he signed! — “restrains the speech of a wide variety of groups on issues of public import in the months closest to an election.”
But, have no fear, the super Court is here. “I expect,” he explained, “that the courts will resolve these legitimate legal questions as appropriate under the law.”
No sale. Congressmen, senators, and presidents alike swear to protect and defend the same constitution as the Supremes do. In the 19th century, Congress actually debated constitutionality with passion, and if it found a proposed law falling short of that standard, it was fixed or killed, not outsourced to the Supreme Court for retrofitting.
The Court, by assuming that responsibility, and the other branches of government, by surrendering it, have permanently damaged the constitutional order. Indeed, Thomas Jefferson believed that a judiciary with final jurisdiction over the constitutionality of presidential and legislative actions “would make the judiciary a despotic branch” of government.
A long time ago, SCOTUS kept its powers confined to adherence of cases to the law and the law's adherence to the Constitution.
In the last 40 years, the Supremes have turned our legal system into a bazaar of venue shopping. Constitutional protections like freedom of speech are now at the whim of a bunch of legal hacks in robes choosing decisions on the prevailing winds or their existing prejudices.
I never thought it was possible for me to have less respect for a profession than a US senator. But thanks to clowns in robes like Justice Kennedy, I found one.
2 comments:
When SCOTUS became partisan, back with the Warren court, it lost its purpose. They don't have D's and R's next to their name, but they might as well. It has become an *uber* congress. That is, all the power of congress, consolidated into 9 individuals, loaded with political opinion, accountable to no voter. It has become far to powerful and dangerous. Unfortunately, the court has a swing vote that leans left and is likely to stay that way for at least another decade. Probably longer.
Amen brother.
If you read the Bill of Rights and subsequent amendments, you'll notice that all the amendments (except the 21st-prohibition) were to acknowledge and expand on individuals' rights.
There are no "collective" rights of states outlined in the Bill of rights except in the 10th amendment where it outlines.
"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people."
This BS by liberals on militias in the second amendment is a smokescreen to their liberalism.
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