Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., joined the growing ranks of members of Congress in issuing a warning to the Supreme Court: reaffirm Roe v. Wade or else. The “else” varies from promises to pack the Court to personal accountability for justices. For Shaheen, it is a promise of “revolution.” It is the latest demand that the justices yield to popular demand or any countervailing interpretation of the Constitution. Or else.
“So you say you want a revolution.” However, these threats are an attack on the very concept of impartial judicial review. “When you talk about destruction” of our traditions of judicial review, as the Beatles declared in 1968, “you can count me out.”
I understand that Sen. Shaneen is speaking of a political rather than actual revolution but the implication is that there would be consequences for the Court.
Threatening the Supreme Court has become something of a required public exhibition of faith for Democrats, a demonstration that abstract notions like judicial independence will not distract from achieving political results. Sen. Richard Blumenthal previously warned the Supreme Court that, if it continued to issue conservative rulings or “chipped away at Roe v Wade” it would trigger “a seismic movement to reform the Supreme Court. It may not be expanding the Supreme Court, it may be making changes to its jurisdiction, or requiring a certain numbers of votes to strike down certain past precedents.”
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer also declared in front of the Supreme Court “I want to tell you, Gorsuch, I want to tell you, Kavanaugh, you have released the whirlwind, and you will pay the price.”
The message is clear and unambiguous: vote “correctly” or you will face personal or institutional repercussions.
According to these politicians, the media, and many in academia, justices should consider such consequences in reading the Constitution. These type of extrinsic considerations are anathema to ethical judging. A jurist should not be concerned how her ruling will be received as opposed to whether it is based on principled interpretative principles. That is precisely why the Framers gave these jurists life tenure. As Alexander Hamilton stated in The Federalist No. 78, judicial independence “is the best expedient which can be devised in any government to secure a steady, upright, and impartial administration of the laws.”
It was once viewed as anathema to attack the Court or threaten retaliation if justices did not vote as demanded. Indeed, many Democrats criticized President Donald Trump for attacking judges as partisans during his Administration. Now, however, Democrats routinely denounce conservatives as activists and threaten to change the Court if they continue to rule conservatively. Notably, while pointing to conservatives voting together as proof of ideological bias, these same leaders do not denounce the liberal justices who routinely vote as a block from the left of the Court. They are not ideologues because they are ruling “correctly.”
Roe is being used by many as an excuse to engage in raw court packing and jurisdiction stripping. Leaders like Shaheen are suggesting that, if the Court votes wrong, they have license to unleash the “Revolution.” Even academics who criticized Roe are now advocates for court packing. Harvard Professor Laurence Tribe once declared that “one of the most curious things about Roe is that, behind its own verbal smokescreen, the substantive judgment on which it rests is nowhere to be found.” Yet, Tribe is leading other activist professors in calling for the Court to be packed to ensure a liberal majority.
Despite widespread criticism of the constitutional basis for Roe, it is now considered an inviolate case of “super precedent.” Anyone arguing that the issue should be returned to the states in whole or in part are denounced as reactionaries. That position ignores the fact that even Ruth Bader Ginsburg criticized the decision: “Roe, I believe, would have been more acceptable as a judicial decision if it had not gone beyond a ruling on the extreme statute before the court. … Heavy-handed judicial intervention was difficult to justify and appears to have provoked, not resolved, conflict.”
What is fascinating about threats against the Court (and insulting billboards by groups like Demand Justice) is that they clearly undermine the effort to preserve abortion rights. If anything, justices are more likely to push back on such pressures rather than yield to them. Yet, it is politically popular to show that you will stop at nothing to achieve political ends, even destroying one of the core institutions in our constitutional system.
In the end, the response to politicians threatening revolution remains the same as it has for the roughly 250 years: bring it on. We had a revolution that ultimately secured our core rights and institutions. Let’s have this debate. A negative ruling from the Court certainly can lead to renewed political campaign, particularly on the state level. However, the directing of such comments to the Court raised great unease for many of us. Regardless of how we feel about the merits of Roe, we remain a nation united by a common article of faith called the United States Constitution. Our politicians may have lost that defining faith, but most Americans are unlikely to embrace the new Revolution over the Constitution:
“You say you’ll change the constitution
Well, you know
We all want to change your head
You tell me it’s the institution
Well, you know
You better free your mind instead”
We get a revolution every 365 days.
Love it when the Federalists quote the Beatles.
So we come to this: “Anyone arguing that the issue should be returned to the states in whole or in part are denounced as reactionaries.”
Well, as someone who grew up with a woman that worked in an Ohio hospital pre Roe, and the doctors and nurses and tech staff in that hospital had to run an underground railroad to transport women at risk to NY in order for them to get a ‘safe’ abortion, I take a much less academic and navel gazing approach to the matter. Yes, your victim consciousness doesn’t appreciate being called reactionary in the circles you travel, Turley. And I’m sure it stings. But you, like Kavanaugh and Barret and Gorsuch, have been in the Federalist Society pipeline for years now and, truth is, your existence there has been acid tested with your willingness to overthrow Roe when given the chance. So this reaction to being called reactionary is fun, no doubt…, but I just see you as highly impractical.
I literally can not believe this country is willing to re visit the freak show that was pre Roe reality in many states. It’s a thoughtless, impractical, discriminatory and self destructive desire…, and all just because your source of political money has demanded it since Roe became law.
Roe is super precedent. You don’t like it. And I know I’ll not be able to convince you of it. I will take no pride in pointing out the resulting dysfunction when the states get their hands on the aftermath of what the Court seems poised to do. We know as many as half will immediately jump on severe abortion restriction. Catastrophically bad times on the court. And I feel sorry for the country that will have to experience all over again the nightmare times of pre Roe.
“Well, as someone who grew up with a woman that worked in an Ohio hospital pre Roe, and the doctors and nurses and tech staff in that hospital had to run an underground railroad to transport women at risk to NY in order for them to get a ‘safe’ abortion, I take a much less academic and navel gazing approach to the matter.”
Swiiiiing Low, Sweet Chariot – commin’ for to carry me hooooommee . . .
Is there a statue, a memorial, anything to “a woman that worked in an Ohio hospital pre Roe?” If not, there sure should be.
“Roe is super precedent.”
Can you name – for the rest of us – a “super precedent” that you don’t like?
Not sure I’m a fan of the plus sign in the middle of your name, although, it has precedence somewhere no doubt..
You know you don’t have to write anything in response if you don’t have the wit or wisdom to engage in this sort of jousting. I’m the sporting sort.
I could go with you all day, cap. Just don’t have patience for morons anymore.
No wonder you need constant company.
Well, I suppose in that case I have found my very own Washington Generals.
PRECEDENT IS NOT VIABLE
_______________________
“The Constitution does not expressly discuss the role of judicial precedent or the doctrine of stare decisis.”
“[The Supreme] Court cautions that no precedent is beyond reconsideration and the doctrine of stare decisis is not an ‘inexorable command’ to endure the mistakes of the past.”
– Notre Dame Law School
____________________
Precedent is moot.
“Precedent” is not “viable.”
Any court presented with a case must objectively adjudicate the case on the merits and, in the process, correct previous wrong decisions.
Roe v Wade is egregiously wrong on multiple points:
– Abortion is not a constitutional or federal issue.
– Abortion is a power reserved to the people, or to the States.
– Abortion is homicide, wherein a homo or human is cided or killed (a zygote or nascent human being is a human being nonetheless).
So wrong. So often.
You’ve found a title for your Autobiography! Congratulations, Anon.
Point conceded.
Now, can I abort my inconvenient, rude and belligerent neighbor.
I don’t like laws against murder.
Does God or nature direct the killing of babies?
How many species kill their babies?
Oh, and looks like murder happens despite the many laws against it.
If I don’t understand you; does that mean I can’t process logic?
Is it possible that nature and God are as illogical and incoherent as you?
If I understand, you claim a right to do anything you desire regardless of the law or the opinion of others, including the opinions of babies in the womb.
Is abortion (i.e. euthanasia) of an incognizant patient in an Alzheimer’s ward correct, appropriate, moral or legal.
Deflect, distract and attack. Good answer. Lol.
The “super precedent” establishes a rite of elective abortion, slavery, diversity [dogma] (e.g. racism), political congruence (i.e. selective inclusion) in darkness, privacy, or, in principle, whenever you can get away with it. The Twilight Amendment has been a source of progressive mischief over the decades and the nominally “secular” Pro-Choice religion over the millennia.
There is no mystery in sex and conception. A woman and man have four choices, self-defense through reconciliation, and still six weeks to hold a reproductive rite. The tell-tale hearts beat sooner and ever louder. #HateLovesAbortion
k, trumper.
The federal government should be out of the abortion debate. Leave it to the individual states to determine what goes on in their confines. And accept the will of the people in each state, no matter what, pro life or pro choice, the will of the people must be respected.
.
Sodom’s Judges
In examining Jewish rabbinical literature, the Talmud and Midrash contain oral traditions, exegesis of Torah texts and homiletic stories that give us insight into Jewish and biblical history. They are reliable sources to gain additional understanding and knowledge of Jewish thought and truth.
One of the teachings refers to the Judges of Sodom, (Genesis 19) who historically were named Kaz-sheker (greatest liar), Rab-sheker (master of lies), Rab-nabel, (master of turpitude), Rab-masteh Din (chief perverter of the law), and Kelepandar (forger). (1) These judges had enforced laws that were oppressive to the poor, sexually permissive and resulted in a society where justice and legal sense were ignored to accommodate the desires of a ruling few. This resulted in a chaotic culture where historical and biblical accounts record an “upside down” civilization, with the weak exploited by the rich and powerful.
One story tells of a poor man who was secretly kept alive with scraps of bread by a compassionate citizen. When the judges found this out, they ruled the gracious person be burnt to death. It’s hard for us to imagine such a thing and yet that was how Sodom and the cities of the plain lived each day. In addition, the biblical record tells us that Lot, Abraham’s nephew was daily tormented with the filthy conversation and lifestyle of the wicked people he was living with (2 Peter 2:8).
The Genesis record tells us that God heard the cries of those who were oppressed and went down to deal with the wickedness of Sodom (Genesis 19:20, 21). On the fateful night, a homosexual mob of men gathered outside of Lot’s house and demanded he open the door so the men could have sex with the visitors staying at Lot’s home. These were the angels God had sent to rescue Lot, but the mob did not know this.
Those who say the sin of Sodom had nothing to do with homosexuality and sexual looseness, ignore the clear account of the Genesis text, the second Peter text, and the Jude, verse 7 text that refers to gross immorality in Sodom. In addition, the prophet Ezekiel expands on this and gives us a comprehensive view of Sodom and the culture of the cities of the plain: “Behold, this was the guilt of your sister Sodom: she and her daughters had arrogance, abundant food and careless ease, but she did not help the poor and needy. Thus they were haughty and committed abominations before me (Ezekiel 16:49 NASB). The overabundance and careless ease led to the abominations that refer to the ongoing sexual perversion of the cities.
Justice and morality had been denied in all areas of the culture of Sodom as a result of the rulings of a few judges, who felt it was a civil duty to impose their personal views on the entire population. People in Sodom had no choice but to agree, be silent, leave or if they spoke up, risk their futures and very life.
It continually amazes me how relevant and up to date the bible is, in the 21st century. Activist Judges in America are daily overruling the will of the people and imposing immoral, personal views towards the citizens of this country on a number of issues and distorting justice at every turn. Just recently, a morally, misled judge arbitrarily overturned North Carolina’s gay marriage ban, even though North Carolinians overwhelmingly voted against same-sex marriage. Other states have also, wrongly had the imposition of the minority forced on the majority. It is interesting these laws cannot be set aside, except through dishonest, judicial tyranny.
Please recognize then, it was the rulings of the Judges of Sodom that brought the judgment of God on Sodom and the cities of the plain and, following the historical pattern, it will be the rulings of activist judges and a silent, sleepy, Christian majority that will result in the swift hand of judgment on America. God is always grieved when the courts rule against righteousness and lawlessness prevails.
https://markivey.wordpress.com/2014/10/17/sodoms-judges/
Tim Shey,
Zzzzzzzzz…..
The Democrats empty rhetoric is outrageous. They could have signaled their support for women by getting rid of the Hyde Amendment one of the times they had control of all branches. The Supremes are probably wondering: you, and what army.
State of America under Democrats. SF looters looting other looters. No police. Major Ferguson Effect. Never arrest a black person if you value your job and liberty.
https://notthebee.com/article/please-enjoy-this-video-of-looters-looting-other-looters-
Anarchy layered on anarchy.
No wonder Pelosi bought beach-front property in Florida. [Doesn’t she, like Obama, think the ocean is about to rise?}
Pelosi bought beachfront property in Florida? And she is just a “poor” Congresswoman? As someone who lives in Florida, I hope Nancy doesn’t bring her ideas here to destroy our great State, as she did in her own State of California.
Sorry if this is macabre but the woman is 81. I could be wrong but she is probably moving to Florida to follow the life story arc of other 81 year olds who moved to Florida. Those tend not to be multipart sagas if you know what I mean.
This is short and worth reading:
https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2021/11/will-france-save-the-west.php
It fits with what I saw in France last time I was there. Paris seemed like Beirut.
Thanks for the link… Interesting speech. Hope he means it.
Justice Thomas asked an interesting question: “Does a mother have a right to ingest drugs and harm a pre-viable baby? Can the state bring child neglect charges against the mother? “
Exactly. Do actions have consequences or not??
Young, one of the reasons abortion was legalized was to allow women with drug and alcohol problems to ‘opt out’ of pregnancies. If a woman lacks the self-discipline to stay sober during pregnancy, she is ‘not’ ready for motherhood.
This relates to a discussion I was having several weeks ago on this thread when one or more commenters suggested an embryo or fetus was essentially a non-entity with no legal rights.
I countered that that was not likely true because there were at least inchoate legal issues in play. I had in mind, for example, in utero damages caused by medical error or pharmacological problems or homicide of the mother. A mere thing would not have even inchoate legal rights in those situations.
A more complex situation has arisen when a woman’s last chance for a child was in vitro fertilization. There have been a couple of instances in which embryos were created and the couple divorced. The woman wanted the embryos and the man did not because he would be on the hook for child support for a child he no longer wanted with a woman who would no longer share his life. A cloud of legal potentials came with those embryos.
A different situation arose when a wealthy couple with embryos in freeze were killed in a crash before they could be implanted. They may have wanted those embryos to be handled by a surrogate so they would have a promise of heirs. Other potential heirs probably would not want them retained.
There are many other situations that could arise but it is clear that non-viable embryos are not as clear of the legal system as they would be if they were rocks. As soon as they take on some aspect of human life they also take on some role in the legal system.
Justice Thomas’ trenchant question illuminates yet another side of the issue.
Life begins at conception
“Life begins…” and it will continue.
Abortion stops life.
Abortion is homicide.
What no one is discussing is the fact that banning abortion won’t stop it. Women who are desperate will find a way, even if it kills them. Guess that life doesn’t count, right. It should be left up to the individual woman, and no one else.
Leaving regulation of abortion to the States will certainly “stop it” in a lot of cases. And whom do you think you are convincing with this sort of emotional blackmail? “Do what I want or I’ll shoot myself, I mean it! It’ll be your fault when I do!” Grow up.
The Constitution does not address abortion.
Abortion is a heinous aberration, not a natural or God-given right addressed by the 9th Amendment.
Abortion may be reserved to the people, or to the states, per the 10th Amendment.
Abortion may be considered an individual right and freedom by the people, or the people may decide that abortion must be addressed collectively by the State.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
10th Amendment
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.
Women who are desperate will find a way, even if it kills them.
Estovir, there is NO agreement in the science community as to exactly WHEN life begins.
ATS: “Estovir, there is NO agreement in the science community as to exactly WHEN life begins.”
When is it not life?
Truth does not depend on “Agreement”. If it did the sun would be going around the earth, witches would be real, the earth would be flat, phlogiston would explain oxygen, and atoms would not be real.
Estovir, there is NO agreement in the science community as to exactly WHEN life begins.
But Judges are positive they know!
There is no Constitutional direction. That means Judges CAN’T make a ruling….leaving such a thing to the PEOPLE
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.
ATS: “Estovir, there is NO agreement in the science community as to exactly WHEN life begins.”
+++
So there is a state in which it is uncertain whether there is not life or whether there is life.
Unsure, my default position is to preserve it.
Unsure, your default position is to destroy it.
“IF YOU IGNORE IT, IT WILL COME”
Are you out of your —-ing mind?!!!
Inexorable, inevitable, unstoppable life in the womb is what irresponsible females are terrified of, and what they are compelled to abort and are obsessed with aborting.
Sorry ladies, you have a natural or God-given duty.
________________________________________
“Theirs not to reason why,
“Theirs but to do and die.”
– Alfred, Lord Tennyson
___________________
“…INITIATING PRENATAL DEVELOPMENT.”
Human fertilization
Human fertilization is the union of a human egg and sperm, occurring in the ampulla of the fallopian tube.[1] The result of this union, leads to the production of a zygote cell, or fertilized egg, initiating prenatal development. Scientists discovered the dynamics of human fertilization in the nineteenth century.[2]
– Wiki
Estovir, there is NO agreement in the science community as to exactly WHEN life begins.
Peter, as far as you are concerned, I am the science.
Life begins with a sparkle in two people’s eyes. You advocate, ultimately, for thought control by the state.
FWIW, you’re doing it wrong.
Actually, you are.
Perhaps that woman should opt out of having sex while unable to be a loving nurturing Mother…..how about that for a novel concept?
That would negate any need for an abortion and the ensuing issues such unwanted or undesirable pregnancies generate.
Instead of worrying about responsibility for one’s actions after the fact…..let’s return to the traditional values where Chasity, Marriage, and Family all have some meaning and value.
Let’s prevent unwanted and un-desirable pregnancies and end abortion upon demand and as a means of Birth Control or convenience.
Yes, we know that a lot of the promises made before Roe about every baby being a wanted baby and so forth turned out to be disastrously false. Subsequent to Roe. more “unwanted” children were brought into the world, not fewer. There is no dearth of children in the United States today born to addicts, single mothers and into generational poverty.
Apparently seeking to trump Sheehan, Sotomayor decides to jump feet first into the political fray by raising the specter of whether the SCOTUS would “survive the stench” if it overturns Roe v. Wade because it would be viewed as a “political act”.
There’s not enough broad sunlight available to disinfect that completely repugnant, partisan and inappropriate remark. To bring political considerations, clear bias and potential consequences to SCOTUS if a ruling goes a certain way is beyond the pale.
Justice Barrett may want to seriously reconsider her “partisan hacks” commentary because there’s clearly at least one.
Sotomayor has never carried a baby. She has never had children, can not fathom what it is like to have carried and given birth to life, nor can Eleanor Kagan. They argue, erroneously, that men have no right to have an opinion on this subject. If true, and I disagree, then nor should barren women like Sotomayor and Kagan. it’s like celibate Catholic priests counseling married couples how to have a joyous marriage.
Then there is Amy C. Barrett, just the opposite
You’ve left out the possibility that some ravenous sex fiend in DC could happen upon Kagan or Sotomayor, and overcome by uncontrollable lust force himself on one of them, and like the Biblical Sarah they could fall pregnant with the assailant’s child. Would you really want one of them to have to carry the child to term, Estovir? What kind of monster are you?
I pity the man, assuming Kagan is into men.
(1) Sotomayor and Kagan may choose to visit a pharmacy for up to three days after unwanted or unprotected sex (whether from an assailant or a frequent lover or spouse) and get the commonly known “morning after pill,” e.g., levonorgestrel, (“emergency birth control”). Under EXISTNG law, they still also have several more weeks to choose to undergo a “D&C” or (if confirmed pregnancy) an early termination thereof. My understanding of the present case is that it only addresses the time frame in which a woman must choose…I really doubt any overthrow to Roe. (2) If persons object to SCOTUS revisiting a case more than 50 years later, to consider the advances of scientific knowledge, technology, and ethos gained over half a century, -then those persons will have to accept the Dred Scott v. Sandford SCOTUS decision (mid-1850s?) and not allow the later SCOTUS ruling overturning it….
(I correct myself. Dred Scott decision was overruled by constitutional amendment, not subsequent SCOTUS decision. I think I was thinking of another case,- (maybe Plessy?)
M, the problem may be that the Court has two justices–Thomas and Alito–and seven politicians.
Access To Safe And Legal Abortion Can Mean The Difference Between Success Or Poverty
One of the best-known examples of the effect of abortion access is the Turnaway Study. It included women who went to 30 clinics in 21 states, and compared those who were just under or over the gestational cutoff for an abortion. In follow-up research, scientists looked at their credit reports for several years before and after the unwanted pregnancy. Being denied an abortion increased the chance that women were living in poverty, were unemployed, had overdue debt or had experienced bankruptcies or evictions.
Edited From:
Mississippi Asks: If Women Can Have It All, Is Roe Necessary?
Today’s New York Times
And now we fully grasp the profundity, cogency and nature of responsibility.
That one is egocentric and reckless, does not absolve one of her obligation and duty.
The singularly important act human beings can undertake is the perpetuation of the species.
The survivors of World War III will know that well by orders of magnitude.
Or, maybe, just maybe, you could not engage in sexual activities that could result in pregnancy if you are not in a position to handle the financial and emotional responsibility of such acts.
Oh, my! As we speak!
A fitting example and attempt to shirk responsibility.
Mere mortal men did not make you female.
Finally, we can all fully appreciate why the Founders found no rationale to provide women the vote.
_____________________________________________________________________________
“Theirs not to reason why,”
“Theirs but to do and die.”
– Alfred, Lord Tennyson, The Charge of the Light Brigade
Yeah, Irregular, and if people drove safely there wouldn’t be any accidents.
Thank you for your deep wisdom.
“Yeah, Irregular, and if people drove safely there wouldn’t be any accidents.
Thank you for your deep wisdom.”
If we just killed the people whom reckless drivers hit with their cars, there wouldn’t be so much unpleasantness after the accidents!
Are you telling me that someone who blows important deadlines is likely to have bad credit? Big if true!
That’s not a defense for murdering babies. There isn’t an excuse for murdering babies.
The “need” to murder babies – or as you say having access to “safe (not for the baby!) and legal abortion” – is the end game resulting from a whole litany of failures in culture, behavior, understanding birth control (and how to use it), etc, etc, coming before the “inconvenient” pregnancy. No responsibility on the front side leads to the morally disgusting and reprehensible act of killing children in the womb.
👆🏽 👆🏽 👆🏽
The Constitution does not address abortion.
The 9th Amendment does not establish abortion as a right.
The Framers considered rights and freedoms to be natural and God-given.
Abortion is the fabricated synthetic antithesis of natural and God-given.
The People or the States have the power to allow or prohibit abortion per the 10th Amendment.
The People have decided that the people must act collectively as the State to prohibit and interdict homicide.
States have decided to prohibit homicide.
A zygote, fetus or baby is a nascent human being.
A nascent human being is a human being.
Abortion is homicide
________________
9th Amendment
The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________
10th Amendment
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.
Anti-Abortion Terrorism Created Self-Fullfilling Prophesy Of Bad Doctors In Mississppi
By the mid-1980s, Mississippi had more than a dozen abortion providers, and the country as a whole had close to 3,000. Then, in the mid-1980s, as antiabortion protesters began bombing clinics and threatening doctors, that number abruptly began to dip nationwide. By 1990, nearly 1,000 doctors had quit, and 84 percent of counties nationwide had no abortion clinic at all, according to surveys conducted then by the Guttmacher Institute, a nonprofit research center that supports abortion rights.
Edited from:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2021/11/30/abortion-mississippi-closed-clinics/
……………………………………………..
The article describes how, for decades, Mississippi has been the most hostile state in the nation for abortion providers. Anyone daring to work at a Mississippi clinic will be relentlessly harassed and threatened. Consequently only the most dubious doctors will consider performing abortions in the state. Invariably said doctors become the subjects of prosecutions. Confirming, in the minds of anti-abortion protesters, that only ‘deviates’ accept such work.
This article reminds us that the so-called ‘Pro-Life’ movement has achieved many of its goals through old fashioned terrorism.
Of course that is one thing they wish to dismiss, others might be the threats to school boards, city councils and Secretary’s of States, US electors, Congress, Senate and library’s. Poll workers, medical doctors, nurses and health care workers. Civil rights workers, US Capital Police. And in the end, democracy itself.
Remember when you guys shot at a group of Republican Congressmen, seriously injuring one? Good times, man.
The abortion mills don’t have drive thru service! Oh, the humanity!
I think abortion would be a slightly less contentious issue if it were left up to the states. That way, citizens in each state can decide, and they can change a law if they don’t like it. People are not stuck with something forever. Voters need to have difficult conversations and make the tough calls, rather than kicking it to the SCOTUS and then complaining they either don’t like the ruling, or are worried it will be overturned.
Overturning Roe v Wade would not delegitimize the court. See Dredd Scott decision.
Karen, this Dred Scott comparison is disingenuous to the point of in-your-face obnoxious. Said comparison implies that overturning Roe is a civil rights issue. So tell us where the long-established civil rights organizations stand on abortion. Is the NAACP supporting Mississippi’s law? The Urban League? BLM? The answer is ‘No’ to all!
“No less a civil rights authority than Al Sharpton disagrees with you” is perhaps not the best argument you could muster here.
That example was a rebuttal to the argument that if SCOTUS overturns a decision it delegitimizes the court. Of course it doesn’t. The Court has made bad calls in its history.
Some do believe that abortion violates the rights of the unborn, making it the flip side of the civil rights issue of the mother.
Honestly, I think the people of each state should wrangle this out. Already, there is a wide variety of abortion laws. Look at Vermont, which has zero restrictions. You can get an abortion at any time, for any reason in VT.
For if you want money for peoples with minds that hate
I’m telling you brother you’ll just have to wait.
They want a new Constitution and a new Supreme Court because they detest freedom for the average citizen. They believe that they and only they because of their superiority are qualified to tell us how we shall live our lives from the cradle to the grave. They hate the idea that we should have any say in conducting our government because they view us only as deplorables and they hate our despicable little lives. They go to Walmart so with their noses in the air they can smell us. They say they want a revolution well you know we’re all doing what we can. So vote.
The Federalist Court Does ‘Not’ Represent The People
Professor Turley seems to think 6 Federalist judges know what’s best for the country. And though 5 of those 6 are men, we should rest assured they know what’s best for women. However public opinion polls show strong support for safe and legal abortion. Therefore the Federalists could easily forfeit their credibility
https://www.forbes.com/sites/alisondurkee/2021/11/30/how-americans-really-feel-about-abortion-the-sometimes-surprising-poll-results-as-supreme-court-weighs-overturning-roe-v-wade/?sh=3ff44d8c36c9
Should all of our decisions be made by public polls?
What poll are you referring too? How was the question asked?
Jim, every poll taken in the past 50 years shows broad public support for Roe. Currently only 19% of the public wants a total ban. If the Federalists uphold Mississippi’s restrictions, many red states will follow; some with total bans. Then the country, in effect, reverse to a pre-Roe climate where the country is just a loose patchwork of abortion laws.
How many of those people believe – because they’ve been propagandized to believe – that overturning Roe will immediately make abortion illegal in the United States?
Anonymous, those polls also mean that states could work out abortion laws. If the polls in red states do not support a total ban, then there wouldn’t be a total ban.
The cool thing is that if Roe is overturned, you won’t have to divine the intent of the people from public opinion polls – you’ll actually get democratic majorities acting to regulate abortion or not regulate it!
“. . . you’ll actually get democratic majorities . . .”
So, you’re always a fan of absolute majority rule, or just sometimes?
Politicians need to stop threatening the Court. Separate Powers.
…it is politically popular to show that you will stop at nothing to achieve political ends, even destroying one of the core institutions in our constitutional system. — JTurley
The left generally and many elected members of the Democratic Party appear to have adopted the corollary of Carl von Clausewitz’s observation: “Politics is war by other means.”
The Liberals on this Court (that seems to include Roberts) are dead set at over-turning Roe V Wade because it is in their minds “settled precedent” as they have voiced their views so far.
If there is a Supreme Court Decision that is anything but settled precedent then it is exactly Roe V Wade…..beginning with the instant the Decision was issued there has been one challenge after another on every sort of reason imaginable.
Even when reminded of just a few notable instances of prior decisions being reversed…..they continue to refuse to acknowledge that being relevant to Roe.
I sit here and read summaries of how the Court Session went to day….and I am bothered at how shallow some of. the comments and questions of a few of the Justices were.
We have to remember Sotomayor said the Court needed the perspective of a Hispanic Woman….as if that had anything to do with applying Constitutional Law to cases before the Court.
Kagan refused to recuse herself on a case she worked on as Solicitor General….thus showing she has scant concern of conflict of interest.
Breyer is well know for his Left of Center views and a reluctance to adhere to a constructionist view of the Constitution.
Looking back at Justice Ginsberg….except that she stayed too long….at least she seemed to hold to Principle in her decisions even if some felt she went too far or had a perspective that was outside of the mainstream public approval.
The Court should decide whether Abortion is a State Issue….or a Federal Issue….then decide about Viability and access.
Depending upon how the priorities go as to settling the many issues at hand with the case extant and previous cases including Roe V Wade….should see what issues the Court should get involved with in its decision.
If the Court were to see Abortion as a State Issue….then the decision is simple….allow the Fifty States to decide the Abortion issue.
As Abortion is more appropriately a Moral/Ethical/Religious/Political issue….I see it being nothing to do with Federal Law in and of itself.
If Planned Parenthood worked as hard at assisting Adoptions as it did in providing Abortions….perhaps Abortion would become a less popular and convenient option than it is currently.
Here are some thoughts on this and on the oral arguments just concluded:
1. Breyer argued that overruling Casey/Roe would destroy the court’s institutional legitimacy, even if those cases had been wrongly decided, because the court would be perceived as acting politically, simply because different justices are now on the court. I believe he was speaking to Roberts here.
2. Breyer also argued that Casey/Roe are “watershed” precedents and, as such, cannot be overturned even if wrongly decided, absent massive changes in circumstances, which are not present here. Kavanaugh argued to the contrary that many of the court’s most important rulings overturned precedents, implying though not stating expressly that there should be nothing about Casey/Roe that requires special consideration.
3. I think it was Alito (or Gorsuch) who made the point that Plessey should have been overturned immediately, regardless of any change in circumstance, simply because it was wrongly decided. And that was certainly a “watershed” decision, because it permitted white supremacy to be institutionalised throughout the south.
4. Kavanaugh stated Mississippi’s position that the court should not be taking sides on this issue, because the constitution is neutral, and so the matter should be left to the states, and possibly Congress. He articulated this a couple of times.
5. The question was raised of how to distinguish abortion from other liberty interests now protected by substantive due process. Mississippi said this was the only one that involved extinguishing life. It also said the others were better grounded in history and tradition, a weak argument I think.
6. It was not clear if or how an undue burden standard could be retained if pre-viability prohibitions were to be allowed.
I think Thomas, Alito and probably Gorsuch will vote to overturn Casey/Roe. Barrett and Kavanaugh probably believe they were wrongly decided but may shrink from overturning them. Very hard to say. Roberts may think they were wrongly decided but will vote to preserve them because of the political pressure he believes overturning them would put on the court, and because he doesn’t want sophisticated elite opinion to turn against him. It is hard to see a compromise that eliminates the prohibition on pre-viability abortions but nonetheless retains Casey/Roe.
We are actually discussing the fact a current Supreme Court Justice is operating at the will of political pressure?!? Doesn’t that go completely against the whole purpose and function of the Supreme Court and the separate functioning bodies of Government??? Why are the Supreme Court Judtices not more immune to political pressure???
“Breyer argued that overruling Casey/Roe would destroy the court’s institutional legitimacy, even if those cases had been wrongly decided, because the court would be perceived as acting politically, simply because different justices are now on the court. I believe he was speaking to Roberts here.”
Yeah – if there’s one thing Breyer is known for, it is safeguarding the Court’s public perception as an institution rather than reaching out and grabbing hot button social issues and removing them from the democratic process. What a damned hack.
The justices are good jurists and the court has made some really good corrective-rulings in recent years but what some of us don’t get today is this:
In 2021, we have 20 years of hard evidence that more than 90% of the people tortured and covertly blacklisted (the worst form of torture) had absolutely nothing to do with 9/11 or any terrorism whatsoever or any crime. Terrorism was used to bypass constitutional due process.
Today every state operates a “Fusion Center” largely funded by Congress and federal agencies – primarily funding mission-creep that destroys innocent people. Since 9/11, terrorism authorities have been used on non-violent trespassers, all-black colleges, LGBT-Americans, environmental groups, etc. where no probable cause or judicial warrants were obtained. None of these groups ever killed anyone. Fusion Centers even uploaded “suspicious persons” from as far back as the 1980’s onto the post-2001 blacklists – prosecutors usually call this fraud for the rest of us. Apparently the more suspicious people, the more money they make.
We can forgive the court for ignoring this right after 9/11 but in 2021 we have the proof. Judicial Review is the court’s top duty since “Marbury v. Madison”. Please continue the corrective-rulings ASAP!