Tag Archives: Supreme Court

Williamsport Sun-Gazette: Trump attorneys to take case to Supreme Court

27 Nov
MARK NANCE/Sun-Gazette Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, left, waves to the crowd as he arrives at the U.S. Federal Courthouse and Herman T. Schneebeli Federal Office Building Tuesday for a hearing before U.S. District Court Judge Matthew T. Brann Tuesday.

https://www.sungazette.com/news/top-news/2020/11/trump-attorneys-to-take-case-to-supreme-court/

Lawyers for President Donald J. Trump said Sunday that a federal court judge’s dismissal of their case Saturday on trying to stop the results of the election from being certified by state Secretary of State Kathy Boockvar gives them opportunity to bring their case to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Rudy Giuliani, attorney to President Trump and Jenna Ellis, senior legal adviser to Trump 2020 Campaign, said a decision by U.S. Middle District Judge Matthew W. Brann to dismiss the case will help them move the case to the higher court.

Brann dismissed the lawsuit against Boockvar and seven counties, brought by Trump’s campaign for reelection, dealing another blow to the president’s attempts to undermine Election 2020’s decisive results.

“Today’s decision turns out to help us in our strategy to get expeditiously to the U.S. Supreme Court,” Trump lawyers said.

“Although we fully disagree with this opinion, we’re thankful to the President Barack Obama-appointed judge for making this anticipated decision quickly, rather than simply trying to run out the clock.”

Trump is seeking an expedited appeal to the Third Circuit.

“There is so much evidence that in Pennsylvania, Democrats eliminated our opportunity to present 50 witnesses and other evidence that election officials blatantly ignored Pennsylvania’s law denying independent review,” the Trump team said.

“This resulted in 682,777 ballots being cast illegally, wittingly or unwittingly.”

“We are disappointed we did not at least get the opportunity to present our evidence at a hearing,” Giuliani and Ellis said.

“We hope that the Third Circuit will be as gracious as Judge Brann in deciding our appeal one way or the other as expeditiously as possible.”

“This is another case that appears to be moving quickly to the United States Supreme Court.”

However, civil rights and advocacy groups led by the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, the American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania, the ACLU Voting Rights Project, Public Interest Law Center, and the law firm Covington & Burling LLP represented the Black Political Empowerment Project, Common Cause Pennsylvania, League of Women Voters of Pennsylvania, NAACP Pennsylvania State Conference, and eight impacted voters as intervenors. Last week, hailed Brann hailed the ruling as a victory for democracy and the state’s voters.

“The court saw through the attempts by President Trump and his enablers in Washington and Harrisburg to interfere with democracy,” said Reggie Shuford, executive director of the ACLU of Pennsylvania. “The people of Pennsylvania have had their say, and it time to put this election behind us.”

MARK MARONEY

mmaroney@sungazette.com

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Mark Caserta: Kavanaugh Hearings Become Circus in the Senate

1 Oct

The U.S. system of confirming Supreme Court justices has forever been tarnished.

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Day 1 of Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation process in the Senate.

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Mark Caserta:  Free State Patriot editor

October 1, 2018

 

 

“Cry havoc and let slip the dogs of war!”  The military order “Havoc”, was a signal given to the English military forces in the Middle Ages directing the troops (in Shakespeare’s colloquialism “the dogs of war”) to pillage and create chaos.

This phrase seems to define the new political methodology of the progressive Democrat Party.  Truly, these “representatives of the people” have pillaged the Senate confirmation process and instigated nothing less than fruitless, feckless havoc in the Senate chambers.

This “circus in the Senate,” masquerading as Judge Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation hearings has forever compromised the integrity and efficiency our judicial system, most assuredly for Republicans and Democrats, but more tragically, for Americans.

Understand, we’re talking about the Supreme Court, the highest court in the land, where we need our brightest, most dexterous constitutional scholars weighing in on matters of the U.S. Constitution, on behalf of the American people!

But who the “H-E – “double-toothpicks” is going to want to throw their name in the hat to become a Supreme Court Justice?  Can you imagine anyone more qualified than Brett Kavanaugh seeking to join the highest court in the land? Yet, at the peril of losing a distinctive mechanism of our Republic, progressives have methodically orchestrated his failure, even before they knew anything about the man, much less the adjudicator!

Realistically, in the future, what sort of servant will be willing to place his or her livelihood and reputation on the altar of these politically ravenous, self-centered politicians?

Imagine, for a moment, that any individual, lacking any sort of verifiable proof, could presume any number of wild accusations against you, ignoring even the most noble of causes. Subsequently, they would force you into proving, beyond reasonable doubt, that you were innocent, or be subject to the unjust consequences of a guilty person.

Really?  We now have a “presumption of guilt” rather than a “presumption of innocence!

My friends, can you imagine the world in which we would live? Anyone wishing to cause any degree of harm, to anyone, for any reason, would be empowered to create havoc in their lives given the proper venue.

In fact, this is so upside down in its concept, any sane person would deem it laughable to even make the argument.  But not so, for liberal Democrats, who couldn’t give a rat’s hairy backside for your well-being.

Do we really pay these people to be this utterly negligent in their sworn duties to the United States?  Why do we keep hiring them year after year!

While the phrase, “presumption of innocence” isn’t articulated in the Constitution of the United States, as precedent, it’s been a basic component of a fair trial, or the fundamental liberty of Due Process as secured by the Fourteenth Amendment.

It is, in fact, the legal burden of the prosecution, to collect and present compelling evidence necessary to convict any individual of a crime.  If reasonable doubt remains, the accused must be acquitted.

The antics of liberal Democrats represent the antithesis of this constitutional premise.

But, in fairness, the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh has never been about guilt or innocence.  It’s about blocking a legitimate conservative nominee of the President of the United States, Donald J. Trump, a man duly elected in 2016 by the American people who knew the balance of the Supreme Court, presumably for the next generation, would be decided by the next president.

As many are aware, an appointment to the U.S Supreme Court is a lifetime appointment to the highest court in the land.  Through the years, the court has been integral in giving us Roe v. Wade, the Affordable Care Act, and many other rulings heavily impacting our lives.

My fault, your fault, nobody’s fault, ownership of the ideological balance of the court has become a politically, weaponized tool for which many politicians would sell their soul, as it represents the “supreme” decision-making power in our country when argument meets impasse.

Throughout his campaign, Donald Trump made it clear he would appoint conservative judges who would interpret the law, versus legislating political ideology from the bench.  He even provided a list from which he would choose his nominees.

How can one be more transparent?

But trust me when I tell you President Trump could have nominated the honorable, Chief Justice John Marshall and liberal Democrats would have done everything possible to discredit him for the court.

It’s really quite sad the crippling concessions liberals are willing to make for Americans and our country simply to propagate their progressive ideology.

At what point does this “betraying of one’s country” become treasonous in nature?

I submit it already has.

Are these the people we want representing us in Washington?  Is this the ideology we want infesting our state? Our city?

I believe this is a problem that must be addressed on a national and local level, simultaneously.  As patriots, we have a responsibility to leverage our vote to return our country, our state and our city to greatness.

It’s crucial we begin examining politicians “records and actions” versus “politically expedient rhetoric.” Not only are they doing our people a disservice, they are now becoming enemies of the state, seeking to enhance their power and influence.

Liberals cannot be allowed to pillage and create havoc any longer.  And it’s up to you to stop them.

Get mad if you want, but anything less, frankly, makes one complicit in the offense.

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Mark Caserta: Court may address abortion during Trump presidency

24 Jul

pro life

Roe v Wade is not settled law

 

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Mark Caserta:  Free State Patriot editor

Jul 20, 2018

 

God’s Word leaves no doubt when life begins.

Luke 1:41-42 shares the delightful account of Elizabeth (six months pregnant with her son, later to be known as John the Baptist), being visited in the hill country of Judea by her friend Mary (who had just been told by an angel she’d found favor with God and would give birth to our Savior, Jesus.)

“And it came to pass, that, when Elizabeth heard the salutation of Mary, the babe leaped in her womb; and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Ghost. And she spake out with a loud voice, and said, ‘Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb.'”

This year marks the 45th anniversary of the Supreme Court’s landmark decision in Roe v. Wade. In January, people from across our nation gathered in our nation’s capital for the annual March for Life.

It was heartening that among the estimated 100,000 plus participants, teenagers and young adults recognizing the impact the 1973 court decision has had on their generation carried signs reading, “One-third of my generation is missing,” referencing more than 1 million babies, on average, aborted each year in the U.S., per The Baptist Press.

What makes this particularly encouraging is that people younger than my generation of baby boomers are taking notice of the infanticide plaguing our nation for decades because of a progressive movement that incessantly challenges the standards of morality and principles of life God desires for our nation.

The acceptance of abortion in society is an example of liberals successfully achieving a foothold in an emotional issue and tenaciously working to challenge the argument’s viability. This is done by gradually improving the general standard of acceptability through attrition of the opposition’s resolve and desensitization to the moral consequences.

The court’s primary decision in Roe v. Wade held that a person may choose to have an abortion until a fetus becomes viable, based on the right to privacy contained in the due-process clause of the 14th Amendment.

The court then applied a controversial trimester time line designed to guide judges and lawmakers in balancing the mother’s health against the viability of the fetus.

In the first trimester, the woman had the exclusive right to pursue an abortion, not subject to state intervention. In the second trimester, the state couldn’t intervene unless the mother’s health was at risk.

Once the pregnancy enters the third trimester, the state could restrict the right to an abortion but must always include an exception if the health of the mother is at risk.

Let’s be clear. Choosing abortion simply to negate another poor choice in life is not a “health care” choice, as some argue. Since 1973, compromise and outright pandering has resulted in abortion available on demand and in many instances, merely for convenience.

Twice, in history, a decision to destroy children before they could fulfill their life’s mission was employed. Both followed the emergence of a “deliverer.”

During the birth of Jesus, King Herod, fearing for his kingdom, sought to destroy the Christ child. Unable to engage the Magi in locating the child, he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem who were 2 years old and younger.

In retaliation for plagues Egypt endured following Pharaoh’s refusal to let the Israelites go at the prompting of God’s chosen deliverer, Moses, Pharaoh ordered every Hebrew boy to be “thrown into the Nile.” Sadly, Egypt suffered from his decree.

The return of our Deliverer is approaching. Righting this inherently wrong decision to destroy life is not an option we can ignore if given the opportunity.

Mark Caserta is a conservative blogger, a Cabell County resident and a regular contributor to The Herald-Dispatch editorial page.

 

 

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Doug Smith: Liberal “settled law” about to be shaken by a new era of SCOTUS.

2 Jul

supreme court

Current 2018 U.S. Supreme Court

 

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Doug Smith is a historian and social editor for Free State Patriot

July 2, 2018

 

The left is facing the possibility, after generations of relying on SCOTUS as a sort of rump Congress, of a court which will follow the very (for them) inconvenient Constitution.

Their reactions are nothing, if not predictable.

Like the toddler who thoughtfully redecorates your wall with shoe polish, the Left, mostly the Dems, (but we must include Susan Collins and the other Rinos in this category), they have no idea of the intended purpose of the Court and are destructive in their creative misapplications.

Because so many of them failed Civics, failed to take it, or took over the education system and replaced with social studies to create generations of Americans who had no earthly idea how their government functions, a brief recap.

We have 3 branches of government in our representative republic. Within the framework established by the Constitution, the covenant under which the citizens agreed to live, power is loaned, by the consent of the people, to these 3 branches. None of them holds all power, and that is for the safety of the citizens and the republic.

The President, and those Secretaries he appoints, are charged with executing the laws of the United States and keeping it safe through the judicious use of military might.

The Congress is charged with enacting laws, within the framework of the Constitution, for the functioning of the country, and has the sole power to raise, and spend money.

The Supreme Court is charged with ruling on lower court decisions as to the application of laws solely to determine if they are enacted within the boundaries of the Constitution.

The 3 branches are prohibited by the Constitution from usurping each other’s’ functions.  Thus, the President may not allocate money or raise taxes, Congress cannot wage war or enforce the laws they pass, and SCOTUS may not make laws or order the spending or allocation of moneys.

That is how things are done in the representative republic known as the United States of America. Not so in the Province of “Lefterville”.

The Left cannot honestly work within the system, run for election on what they truly believe and desire, get members of Congress elected, and enact their agenda as law. We want tax rates at 70%, 50 million abortions a year, lower wages, and everybody who is not one of us, and thus in charge, dependent on the government so they don’t dare oppose us is not a winning ticket.

So, they lie. But that is a tactic, not a strategy. The strategy is to ignore the Constitution, and the law, and instead rule from the bench as if the judges and justices were reigning over a ducal fief.

And this brings us to a favorite phrase of the Left: Settled Law. (Settled science or consensus is a similar favorite, with the same nefarious aim: to stifle dissent. When a Lefty says, “It is Settled Law, of course, what they mean is “It’s a law we like, some court has ruled our way, so precedent forbids you from EVER changing it.” Of course, they don’t really believe in settled law, because every one of them would overturn the 2nd Amendment tomorrow if they thought they could get away with it.

So “Settled Law” means, for them, (reminiscent of the Russians, who never give back land taken in conquest when the war is over), that anything they have won, they get to keep forever. If you try to take it back, they will respond with hysteria, shrieks, obscenities, death threats, and of course, always, and forever, some way to make it about (everyone stand and salute now) THE CHILDREN.

If any ruling by SCOTUS were Settled Law, and inviolable, then the Dred Scot decision of 1857 would be the precedent for keeping slavery alive to this day. Instead, the 13thAmendment, ratified in December 1865, forbade slavery or involuntary servitude in the United States.

Did you catch it? I just whizzed by you, plain as day. The Left misses it. How about you?

Ah, yes, there IS a settled law. It was settled because 13 colonies of the British Empire declared their independence, fought for it, and 6 years later, established and ordained the Constitution of the United States of America. Each subsequent territory, to become a state, agreed to adhere to those laws, and to bear true faith and allegiance to the same. If the people choose to change their laws, as with their experiment with prohibition of alcohol, they have a mechanism to amend the Constitution. And we have done so many times. But you see, to do so, you must persuade most of the folks that it is a good idea.

That is a hard proposition, especially if your ideas and goofy, or have been repeatedly tried and failed. Much easier to get people used to bowing to judges, issuing rulings that force people to DO something, or Congress or States to spend money, (see mini lesson above: Who gets to make laws and distribute money?) Then you merely must pack the courts with judges who will ignore the law and rule according to their politics. FDR applied that principle in trying to pack SCOTUS with 2 extra Leftist Justices in 1937. Thus, the Left does not worry about persuading people of their ideas, but in forcing them on people. Hence their hysterical panic at this nexus in history which offers an opportunity for a generation of a court which will rule according the Constitution, and not popular sentiment, or political correctness.

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Note their arguments: Roe v Wade, Gay Marriage, Obamacare, Immigration Reform, or pick your issue, will be tossed out, overturned, destroyed. Note, as well, what they do, NOT say: if the people want abortion, or gay marriage, or Obamacare, then let them petition their representatives to pass laws to enact it.

In short, they must do what Obama, the quintessential Lefty would not or could not do, persuade. Must easier to step on their necks with judges. And using this principle they have forced the will of a minority elite on most of the folks time and again.

The arrogance that has instilled in them is why Leftists will not debate issues and insist that Global Climate Change Warming Cooling Ice Age Armageddon is Settled Science. That way we don’t have to do research, cost/benefits analysis, or factual reporting. We just must insist that you do it our way, believe our way, or we will throw bad Karma your way.

In short, they don’t want to govern, they want to rule. The Knights of the Black Robe, and their Knight Commander Kennedy have ruled far too much and far too long. But a new day may be at hand. King John is riding toward Runnymede and is about to meet the barons. The Magna Carta is about to be signed. And for a season, or a generation, we may see a move back to the proper roles of government and a court which refuses to make new law. It is the form of government under which we live.

But those who prosper by usurping it will not cheer. Nor will they accept it quietly. We ought to win the fight but be ready for Lefties marching in the streets (since they have no jobs and exist on welfare or have government jobs and thus can get off to go protest the government for whom they work, which, by the way, may also change shortly), Lefties wearing hats resembling genitalia, pitiful, even if faked, pictures of crying children, and Borkian tales of Dystopia if the Left stops getting its way.

Buckle up.  But it is worth the E ride. A true 5-4 constructionist court will begin to force us to live under our Constitution again, and become a nation of laws, and not of lawyers.

And keep your heads up. SCOTUS has been a flail for a long time. But 2 of the Lefty justices left after Kennedy are 79 and 85 years old. Conservatives will look at some of the wacky positions of the Left, balance that against Trump s Twitter finger, and decide that a 7-2 SCOTUS for a generation sound pretty good and is worth dealing with Trumps eccentricity for another 6 years.

 

 

 

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TRUMP VICTORY! Supreme Court upholds travel ban!!

26 Jun

This is why the Supreme Court is so important…

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WASHINGTON (AP) — A sharply divided Supreme Court on Tuesday upheld President Donald Trump’s ban on travel from several mostly Muslim countries, rejecting a challenge that it discriminated against Muslims or exceeded his authority. A dissenting justice said the outcome was a historic mistake.

The 5-4 decision Tuesday is a big victory for Trump on an issue that is central to his presidency, and the court’s first substantive ruling on a Trump administration policy. The president quickly tweeted his reaction: “Wow!”

Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the majority opinion for the five conservative justices, including Trump nominee Neil Gorsuch.

Roberts wrote that presidents have substantial power to regulate immigration. He also rejected the challengers’ claim of anti-Muslim bias.

But he was careful not to endorse either Trump’s provocative statements about immigration in general or Muslims in particular, including Trump’s campaign pledge to keep Muslims from entering the country.

“We express no view on the soundness of the policy,” Roberts wrote.

The travel ban has been fully in place since December, when the justices put the brakes on lower court rulings that had ruled the policy out of bounds and blocked part of it from being enforced.

In a dissent she summarized in court, Justice Sonia Sotomayor said, “History will not look kindly on the court’s misguided decision today, nor should it.” Justices Stephen Breyer, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Elena Kagan also dissented.

Sotomayor wrote that based on the evidence in the case “a reasonable observer would conclude that the Proclamation was motivated by anti-Muslim animus.” She said her colleagues in the majority arrived at the opposite result by “ignoring the facts, misconstruing our legal precedent and turning a blind eye to the pain and suffering the Proclamation inflicts upon countless families and individuals, many of whom are United States citizens.”

She likened the case to the discredited Korematsu V. U.S. decision that upheld the detention of Japanese-Americans during World War II. Roberts responded in his opinion that “Korematsu has nothing to do with this case” and “was gravely wrong the day it was decided.”

The travel ban was among the court’s biggest cases this term and the latest in a string of 5-4 decisions in which the conservative side of the court, bolstered by the addition of Gorsuch last year, prevailed. Gorsuch was nominated by Trump after Republicans in the Senate refused to grant a hearing to federal appeals Judge Merrick Garland, who was appointed by Barack Obama with more than 10 months remaining in Obama’s term.

The Trump policy applies to travelers from five countries with overwhelmingly Muslim populations — Iran, Libya, Somalia, Syria and Yemen. It also affects two non-Muslim countries, blocking travelers from North Korea and some Venezuelan government officials and their families. A sixth majority Muslim country, Chad, was removed from the list in April after improving “its identity-management and information sharing practices,” Trump said in a proclamation.

The administration had pointed to the Chad decision to show that the restrictions are premised only on national security concerns.

The challengers, though, argued that the court could not just ignore all that has happened, beginning with Trump’s campaign tweets to prevent the entry of Muslims into the United States.

The travel ban has long been central to Trump’s presidency.

He proposed a broad, all-encompassing Muslim ban during the presidential campaign in 2015, drawing swift rebukes from Republicans as well as Democrats. And within a week of taking office, the first travel ban was announced with little notice, sparking chaos at airports and protests across the nation.

While the ban has changed shape since then, it has remained a key part of Trump’s “America First” vision, with the president believing that the restriction, taken in tandem with his promised wall at the southern border, would make the Unites States safer from potentially hostile foreigners.

In a statement he released Tuesday morning, Trump hailed the decision as “a moment of profound vindication” following “months of hysterical commentary from the media and Democratic politicians who refuse to do what it takes to secure our border and our country.”

Strongly disagreeing, Democratic Rep. Keith Ellison of Minnesota said, “This decision will someday serve as a marker of shame.” Ellison, the first Muslim elected to Congress, and Sen. Mazie Hirono of Hawaii, who was born in Japan, both compared the ban and the ruling to the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II.

Critics of Trump’s ban had urged the justices to affirm the decisions in lower courts that generally concluded that the changes made to the travel policy did not erase the ban’s legal problems.

The current version dates from last September and it followed what the administration has called a thorough review by several federal agencies, although no such review has been shared with courts or the public.

Federal trial judges in Hawaii and Maryland had blocked the travel ban from taking effect, finding that the new version looked too much like its predecessors. Those rulings that were largely upheld by federal appeals courts in Richmond, Virginia, and San Francisco.

But the Supreme Court came to a different conclusion Tuesday. The policy has “a legitimate grounding in national security concerns,” and it has several moderating features, including a waiver program that would allow some people from the affected countries to enter the U.S., Roberts said. The administration has said that 809 people have received waivers since the ban took full effect in December.

Roberts wrote that presidents have frequently used their power to talk to the nation “to espouse the principles of religious freedom and tolerance on which this Nation was founded.” But he added that presidents and the country have not always lived up “to those inspiring words.”

The challengers to the ban asserted that Trump’s statements crossed a constitutional line, Roberts said.

“But the issue before us is not whether to denounce the statements. It is instead the significance of those statements in reviewing a Presidential directive, neutral on its face, addressing a matter within the core of executive responsibility,” he said

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Associated Press writers Ashraf Khalil and Jonathan Lemire contributed to this report.

 

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