Liberals! Where Is Your Self-Respect??

[koshergrl]

I couldn't agree more.

 

[konradv]

Uh huh.

As I said, to lefties, the only *right* that anyone has is the right to stomp on those weaker than they are.

It's only your twisted version of the story. Without government that would be the situation and why the RIGHT wants to limit government. They don't want anyone interfering with their stomping.

 

[neomalthusian]

You're declaring them.

I'm acknowledging them as self-evident and universal.

So why did the people of Hiroshima die, if they had a right to life? Did the US commit one of the single biggest human rights violation in history on that day in 1945?

Sure I guess you could say that.

So, if a state passes a law that bans certain firearms from being owned, and you believe it's unconstitutional,

what do you do?

Question 2, why are you so loathe to directly discuss the issue of whether abortion is a God given right?

I'll say it again that bringing up the hot button issues like abortion and gun control tend to make for an unproductive discussion about which rights are a function of policy and which are fundamental/natural. Life/liberty/property are widely regarded as fundamental/natural, but we have some folks he suggesting any rights only exist to the extent that society enforces and protects them.

 

[PoliticalChic]

So? The guy has some ideas, but it is the people and the elected politicians who make the decisions.

Did you just refer to Rehnquist as 'the guy'?
Telling. Quite telling.

Decisions? No doubt.

But if those decisions are not based on the Constitution, they are illegitimate.

That's up to the USSC to decide, then. If they say it's OK, then it is legitimate, like abortion rights and Obamacare. It makes no sense the keep calling things illegitimate when the the court has already said it is. To say we're doing things unconstitutionally should be easily determined by case law. if it isn't, those saying it are wrong.

Clearly you are not conversant with the distinction between originalism and those who believe in a transformative purpose for the Constitution, a 'living Constitution.'

Only when Court decisions are authorized by the Constitution are they legitimate.


Case in point:
http://www.usmessageboard.com/law-a...berals-foreign-law-over-the-constitution.html

 

[PoliticalChic]

No, you do. You think the government should have the final say about it...and your main focus appears to be the DENIAL, not the granting, of human rights.

You don't support the right to life anti-abortion amendment to the Constitution that's been proposed?

You don't want the government to grant personhood and the attendant rights to the fetus?

I don't.

Since same is not authorized in the enumerated powers, it is a state by state decision.

 

[PoliticalChic]

Since we're all here to waste time, I have no problem wasting time quibbling over an immaterial point of semantics.

"United States constitutional law is the body of law governing the interpretation and implementation of the United States Constitution."

I think that definition of constitutional law is satisfactory. Feel free to make a case that it's not.

If the right to abortion is constitutional law, then the right to an abortion is established in the Constitution, via constitutional law, which is the mechanism by which the US Constitution is interpreted and implemented.

1. If it ever became necessary to prove that you are a dunce....although, that would be akin to adding a dunking stool to the Titanic....this would do the trick:

"...an immaterial point..."

Further...it is proof that you are ill equipped to understand or discuss the subject.




a. There is the Constitution...and there is case law, often decided by misguided individuals who believe that there personal views surpass the views within the Constitution.

b. Therefore, my feathered friend, it is hardly semantics to differentiate between the Constitution and decisions which alter same.
To be concise, rather than judicial decisions, the way to alter the Constitution is the amendment process.





2. "I think that definition of constitutional law is satisfactory. Feel free to make a case that it's not."
Certainly simple.
Unfortunately, you are more than simple.

But...I'll try:



a. Justice Wm. Brennan, jr, in 1985, Georgetown speech supported the “transformative purpose” of the Constitution, in which he argued for an “aspiration to social justice, brotherhood, and human dignity…”

How to do that?

By imposing his or any current view of what is just, no matter what the Constitution says. Figure out what result you (Liberals) want...then claim that it's in the law.


b. No…each generation remains bound by the rights its predecessor entrenched, as opposed to a doctrine in which each generation could bring its own meaning to the Constitution.

c. Brennan’s view is that those of us in the present generation are better able to judge than our benighted ancestors. Really? The American Constitution has survived for two centuries, the oldest and first such document in existence, and has inspired countless copies around the world. Through it we remain the freest and most fortunate people on earth.



d. In "A Matter of Interpretation: Federal Courts and the Law," Justice Antonin Scalia criticizes the tendency of federal judges to ignore the text of the Constitution or statues and to adopt “the attitude of the common-law judge -- the mind-set that asks, ‘What is the most desirable resolution of this case, and how can any impediments to the achievement of that result be evaded?’”
Antonin Scalia, A Matter of Interpretation: Federal Courts and the Law, edited by Amy Gutmann (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1997), p. 13.



Do you understand? Either the Constitution holds sway, or the whim of any judge does.

So, if a state passes a law that bans certain firearms from being owned, and you believe it's unconstitutional,

what do you do?

Question 2, why are you so loathe to directly discuss the issue of whether abortion is a God given right?

If a state passes a law, it must be obeyed.
The alternative is to move to a state that has laws more sympatico with my interests.

I believe the Constitution endorses federalism.

“True” rights are inalienable. They exist whether or not they are recognized, and whether or not the ability or the will to defend them exists.

True rights do not impose an implicit obligation upon any other person to provide them to us. In fact, rights exist in greatest measure when we are each simply “left alone”.

If something must be provided to us at the expense of someone else in order for us to have it, then it may be an entitlement, a privilage, or an act of charity – but it is not a “right”.
Rights vs entitlement and privilege | Breckshire … World with a View

 

[PoliticalChic]

So? The guy has some ideas, but it is the people and the elected politicians who make the decisions.

Did you just refer to Rehnquist as 'the guy'?
Telling. Quite telling.


Decisions? No doubt.

But if those decisions are not based on the Constitution, they are illegitimate.

But the Constitution is not a person, it's a large group of words. SOMEONE has to interpret it.

The following from “Originalism,” Steven Calabresi, p. 263
BTW....that annoying thing you do where you suggest I found something on google...I read the book; you should try that.


1. For an originalist, direct evidence of the actual use of a word is the most important source of the word’s meaning. It is more important than referring to the ‘broader context,’ or the ‘larger context,’ or the ‘underlying principles,’ which is the means by which some jurists are able to turn ‘black’ into ‘white’, and ‘up’ into ‘down.’

2. As a basis for understanding the Commerce Clause, Professor Randy Barnett examined over 1500 times the word ‘commerce’ appeared in the Philadelphia Gazette between 1715 and 1800. In none of these was the term used to apply more broadly than the meaning identified by Justice Thomas in his concurring opinion in ‘Lopez,’ in which he maintained that the word ‘commerce’ refers to the trade and exchange of goods, and that process, including transportation of same. A common trilogy was ‘agriculture, manufacturing and commerce.’

3. St. George Tucker’s treatise is the first learned commentary on the Constitution, published in 1802, and describes exactly the rule of construction with respect to the enumerated powers, and the rights retained by the states and by the people.
The opinions of the Supreme Court should echo the theory of strict construction first presented in works like St. George Tucker's View of the Constitution and James Madison's Report on the Alien and Sedition Acts, and reflect this rule of interpretation: federal power must be narrowly construed in order to prevent undue interference with matters best left under state control. In the words of St. George Tucker, the Constitution "is to be construed strictly, in all cases where the antecedent rights of a state may be drawn in question.”
Tucker, View of the Constitution, supra note 6, ed. app. at 151.

 

[there4eyeM]

Not a 'liberal' or other '_', the definitions of these terms fascinate me. Here is one that seems rather reasonable as a point of view on society and government.

"
Liberalism wagers that a state... can be strong but constrained – strong because constrained... Rights to education and other requirements for human development and security aim to advance equal opportunity and personal dignity and to promote a creative and productive society. To guarantee those rights, liberals have supported a wider social and economic role for the state, counterbalanced by more robust guarantees of civil liberties and a wider social system of checks and balances anchored in an independent press and pluralistic society."
—Paul Starr, The New Republic volume 236, pp. 21–24

Personally, I'm for whatever works for human beings so that they become ever more human in all the best and most noble senses.

 

[PoliticalChic]

Since we're all here to waste time, I have no problem wasting time quibbling over an immaterial point of semantics.

"United States constitutional law is the body of law governing the interpretation and implementation of the United States Constitution."

I think that definition of constitutional law is satisfactory. Feel free to make a case that it's not.

If the right to abortion is constitutional law, then the right to an abortion is established in the Constitution, via constitutional law, which is the mechanism by which the US Constitution is interpreted and implemented.

1. If it ever became necessary to prove that you are a dunce....although, that would be akin to adding a dunking stool to the Titanic....this would do the trick:

"...an immaterial point..."

Further...it is proof that you are ill equipped to understand or discuss the subject.




a. There is the Constitution...and there is case law, often decided by misguided individuals who believe that there personal views surpass the views within the Constitution.

b. Therefore, my feathered friend, it is hardly semantics to differentiate between the Constitution and decisions which alter same.
To be concise, rather than judicial decisions, the way to alter the Constitution is the amendment process.





2. "I think that definition of constitutional law is satisfactory. Feel free to make a case that it's not."
Certainly simple.
Unfortunately, you are more than simple.

But...I'll try:



a. Justice Wm. Brennan, jr, in 1985, Georgetown speech supported the “transformative purpose” of the Constitution, in which he argued for an “aspiration to social justice, brotherhood, and human dignity…”

How to do that?

By imposing his or any current view of what is just, no matter what the Constitution says. Figure out what result you (Liberals) want...then claim that it's in the law.


b. No…each generation remains bound by the rights its predecessor entrenched, as opposed to a doctrine in which each generation could bring its own meaning to the Constitution.

c. Brennan’s view is that those of us in the present generation are better able to judge than our benighted ancestors. Really? The American Constitution has survived for two centuries, the oldest and first such document in existence, and has inspired countless copies around the world. Through it we remain the freest and most fortunate people on earth.



d. In "A Matter of Interpretation: Federal Courts and the Law," Justice Antonin Scalia criticizes the tendency of federal judges to ignore the text of the Constitution or statues and to adopt “the attitude of the common-law judge -- the mind-set that asks, ‘What is the most desirable resolution of this case, and how can any impediments to the achievement of that result be evaded?’”
Antonin Scalia, A Matter of Interpretation: Federal Courts and the Law, edited by Amy Gutmann (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1997), p. 13.



Do you understand? Either the Constitution holds sway, or the whim of any judge does.

Is abortion in the first trimester a constitutional right or not?

Poorly decided decision.
It is not in the enumerated powers.

 

[NYcarbineer]

1. If it ever became necessary to prove that you are a dunce....although, that would be akin to adding a dunking stool to the Titanic....this would do the trick:

"...an immaterial point..."

Further...it is proof that you are ill equipped to understand or discuss the subject.




a. There is the Constitution...and there is case law, often decided by misguided individuals who believe that there personal views surpass the views within the Constitution.

b. Therefore, my feathered friend, it is hardly semantics to differentiate between the Constitution and decisions which alter same.
To be concise, rather than judicial decisions, the way to alter the Constitution is the amendment process.





2. "I think that definition of constitutional law is satisfactory. Feel free to make a case that it's not."
Certainly simple.
Unfortunately, you are more than simple.

But...I'll try:



a. Justice Wm. Brennan, jr, in 1985, Georgetown speech supported the “transformative purpose” of the Constitution, in which he argued for an “aspiration to social justice, brotherhood, and human dignity…”

How to do that?

By imposing his or any current view of what is just, no matter what the Constitution says. Figure out what result you (Liberals) want...then claim that it's in the law.


b. No…each generation remains bound by the rights its predecessor entrenched, as opposed to a doctrine in which each generation could bring its own meaning to the Constitution.

c. Brennan’s view is that those of us in the present generation are better able to judge than our benighted ancestors. Really? The American Constitution has survived for two centuries, the oldest and first such document in existence, and has inspired countless copies around the world. Through it we remain the freest and most fortunate people on earth.



d. In "A Matter of Interpretation: Federal Courts and the Law," Justice Antonin Scalia criticizes the tendency of federal judges to ignore the text of the Constitution or statues and to adopt “the attitude of the common-law judge -- the mind-set that asks, ‘What is the most desirable resolution of this case, and how can any impediments to the achievement of that result be evaded?’”
Antonin Scalia, A Matter of Interpretation: Federal Courts and the Law, edited by Amy Gutmann (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1997), p. 13.



Do you understand? Either the Constitution holds sway, or the whim of any judge does.

So, if a state passes a law that bans certain firearms from being owned, and you believe it's unconstitutional,

what do you do?

Question 2, why are you so loathe to directly discuss the issue of whether abortion is a God given right?

If a state passes a law, it must be obeyed.
The alternative is to move to a state that has laws more sympatico with my interests.

I believe the Constitution endorses federalism.

“True” rights are inalienable. They exist whether or not they are recognized, and whether or not the ability or the will to defend them exists.

True rights do not impose an implicit obligation upon any other person to provide them to us. In fact, rights exist in greatest measure when we are each simply “left alone”.

If something must be provided to us at the expense of someone else in order for us to have it, then it may be an entitlement, a privilage, or an act of charity – but it is not a “right”.
Rights vs entitlement and privilege | Breckshire … World with a View

The Supremacy Clause of the Constitution says that a state cannot pass laws that conflict with federal law or the Constitution?

Now you're trying to tell us that the 2nd amendment is unforceable even if states pass laws that may violate it?

 

[PoliticalChic]

So? The guy has some ideas, but it is the people and the elected politicians who make the decisions.

Did you just refer to Rehnquist as 'the guy'?
Telling. Quite telling.


Decisions? No doubt.

But if those decisions are not based on the Constitution, they are illegitimate.

You are totally clueless. A democratically elected government can amend the Constitution at will. And there would be nothing illegitimate about it.

"amend the Constitution at will."

That is exactly what I said. Dim-wit....

....any decision by a court that changes the meaning of the Constitution, or claim of jurisdiction not given by the Constitution is illegitimate.

The only such changes must be via amendment.

 

[PoliticalChic]

Did you just refer to Rehnquist as 'the guy'?
Telling. Quite telling.


Decisions? No doubt.

But if those decisions are not based on the Constitution, they are illegitimate.

You are totally clueless. A democratically elected government can amend the Constitution at will. And there would be nothing illegitimate about it.

This is a common conservative 'argument'. How it goes, quite simply, is...

...if the Supreme Court produces a decision conservatives don't like, it must have been arrived at illegitimately. Conservatives have a habit of believing that by some miraculous process the Constitution of the United States coincided and continues to coincide precisely with the conservative agenda.

"...a decision conservatives don't like,..."

A fib.

I certainly don't like the ObamaCare decision, but predicted it.
And find it totally constitutional.

 

[PoliticalChic]

When I added the OP, [http://www.usmessageboard.com/politics/267192-liberals-where-you-went-wrong.html ] I noted what I believed would be the most antagonistic aspect of Progressive doctrine…the idea that a citizen has no rights. None- except for whatever scraps the elites believe they can have.


Here:
"For over a century the natural rights concept of the Founders, and of Abraham Lincoln, had served as the philosophical foundation for America. But, during the late 19th -early 20th centuries, what we know as ‘progressives’ repudiated the idea. A leading progressive, John Dewey: “Natural rights and natural liberties exist only in the kingdom of mythology and social zoology.”
Dewey, “Liberalism and Social Action,” p. 17.

a. Charles Merriam: “The individualistic ideas of the ‘natural rights’ school of political theory, endorsed in the Revolution, are discredited and repudiated.”
Merriam, “A History of American Political Theories,” p. 307.

3. Let’s be clear: the central doctrine of progressives is that government can withdraw any ‘right’ at any time, as opposed to the view that there are permanent rights founded in “nature and nature’s God.” Perhaps you recall it this way: that humans are “endowed by their Creator” with “unalienable rights.”

a. "Unalienable: incapable of being alienated, that is, sold and transferred." Black's Law Dictionary, Sixth Edition, page 1523: You can not surrender, sell or transfer unalienable rights, they are a gift from the creator to the individual and can not under any circumstances be surrendered or taken. All individual's have unalienable rights.

b. In a 1996 paper, "Private Speech, Public Purpose: The Role of Governmental Motive in First Amendment Doctrine," Obama's Supreme Court Justice Kagan argued it may be proper to suppress speech because it is offensive to society or to the government. : "Whether a given category of speech enjoys First Amendment protection depends upon a categorical balancing of the value of the speech against its societal costs."
WyBlog -- Elena Kagan's America: some speech can be "disappeared"




There were a fairly large number of replies….none of those Liberals, or Progressives, or Obama supporters, challenged the idea!


Is there not ANY contumely Leftists will not recoil from??
No….rather, they accepted the role of a slave, a dog….sitting up and begging, inured to the characterization!! ‘Yes master,…please, may I speak? Or even dream?’


Among those trained, schooled, conditioned....and, yes, brainwashed....there is no self-respect, no demand that they be acknowledged to be worth something as an individual.

Disheartening.
Disgusting.



The warnings weren't enough:

"As usual, the face of Emmanuel Goldstein, the Enemy of the People, had flashed on to the screen. There were hisses here and there among the audience. Goldstein was the renegade and backslider who once, long ago (how long ago nobody quite remembered), had been one of the leading figures of the Party, almost on a level with BIG BROTHER himself, and then had engaged in counter-revolutionary activities, had been condemned to death and had mysteriously escaped and disappeared.

The programmes of the Two Minutes Hate varied from day to day, but there was none in which Goldstein was not the principal figure. He was the primal traitor, the earliest defiler of the Party's purity."
Orwell

You idolize Ann Coulter.

Where's your self-respect?

What a brilliant post.

Next time read the OP, not just the title.

 

[sfcalifornia]

When I added the OP, [http://www.usmessageboard.com/politics/267192-liberals-where-you-went-wrong.html ] I noted what I believed would be the most antagonistic aspect of Progressive doctrine…the idea that a citizen has no rights. None- except for whatever scraps the elites believe they can have.


Here:
"For over a century the natural rights concept of the Founders, and of Abraham Lincoln, had served as the philosophical foundation for America. But, during the late 19th -early 20th centuries, what we know as ‘progressives’ repudiated the idea. A leading progressive, John Dewey: “Natural rights and natural liberties exist only in the kingdom of mythology and social zoology.”
Dewey, “Liberalism and Social Action,” p. 17.

a. Charles Merriam: “The individualistic ideas of the ‘natural rights’ school of political theory, endorsed in the Revolution, are discredited and repudiated.”
Merriam, “A History of American Political Theories,” p. 307.

3. Let’s be clear: the central doctrine of progressives is that government can withdraw any ‘right’ at any time, as opposed to the view that there are permanent rights founded in “nature and nature’s God.” Perhaps you recall it this way: that humans are “endowed by their Creator” with “unalienable rights.”

a. "Unalienable: incapable of being alienated, that is, sold and transferred." Black's Law Dictionary, Sixth Edition, page 1523: You can not surrender, sell or transfer unalienable rights, they are a gift from the creator to the individual and can not under any circumstances be surrendered or taken. All individual's have unalienable rights.

b. In a 1996 paper, "Private Speech, Public Purpose: The Role of Governmental Motive in First Amendment Doctrine," Obama's Supreme Court Justice Kagan argued it may be proper to suppress speech because it is offensive to society or to the government. : "Whether a given category of speech enjoys First Amendment protection depends upon a categorical balancing of the value of the speech against its societal costs."
WyBlog -- Elena Kagan's America: some speech can be "disappeared"




There were a fairly large number of replies….none of those Liberals, or Progressives, or Obama supporters, challenged the idea!


Is there not ANY contumely Leftists will not recoil from??
No….rather, they accepted the role of a slave, a dog….sitting up and begging, inured to the characterization!! ‘Yes master,…please, may I speak? Or even dream?’


Among those trained, schooled, conditioned....and, yes, brainwashed....there is no self-respect, no demand that they be acknowledged to be worth something as an individual.

Disheartening.
Disgusting.



The warnings weren't enough:

"As usual, the face of Emmanuel Goldstein, the Enemy of the People, had flashed on to the screen. There were hisses here and there among the audience. Goldstein was the renegade and backslider who once, long ago (how long ago nobody quite remembered), had been one of the leading figures of the Party, almost on a level with BIG BROTHER himself, and then had engaged in counter-revolutionary activities, had been condemned to death and had mysteriously escaped and disappeared.

The programmes of the Two Minutes Hate varied from day to day, but there was none in which Goldstein was not the principal figure. He was the primal traitor, the earliest defiler of the Party's purity."
Orwell

You idolize Ann Coulter.

Where's your self-respect?

What a brilliant post.

Next time read the OP, not just the title.

You didn't answer my question.

 

[konradv]

Did you just refer to Rehnquist as 'the guy'?
Telling. Quite telling.

Decisions? No doubt.

But if those decisions are not based on the Constitution, they are illegitimate.

That's up to the USSC to decide, then. If they say it's OK, then it is legitimate, like abortion rights and Obamacare. It makes no sense the keep calling things illegitimate when the the court has already said it is. To say we're doing things unconstitutionally should be easily determined by case law. if it isn't, those saying it are wrong.

Clearly you are not conversant with the distinction between originalism and those who believe in a transformative purpose for the Constitution, a 'living Constitution.'

Only when Court decisions are authorized by the Constitution are they legitimate.

Case in point:
http://www.usmessageboard.com/law-a...berals-foreign-law-over-the-constitution.html

Regardless, it's the USSC that decides and once they do it is de jure legitimate. There's no further "only when" qualification. They're the judges.

I am conversant in "originalism" or "original intent" as it's often called. It's a false legal theory that presumes all the Founders were of the same mind. If they had been, they would have written the Constitution that way. Obviously, they weren't and gave us a Constitution that could be interpreted according to the times. Even Jefferson realized that you couldn't tie the people of the future to a document that couldn't foresee their circumstances.

Some men look at constitutions with sanctimonious reverence, and deem them like the ark of the Covenant, too sacred to be touched. They ascribe to the men of the preceding age a wisdom more than human, and suppose what they did to be beyond amendment... laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind... as that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new discoveries are made, institutions must advance also, to keep pace with the times.... We might as well require a man to wear still the coat which fitted him when a boy as civilized society to remain forever under the regimen of their barbarous ancestors.

Thomas Jefferson (on reform of the Virginia Constitution)

 

[PoliticalChic]

You idolize Ann Coulter.

Where's your self-respect?

What a brilliant post.

Next time read the OP, not just the title.

You didn't answer my question.

There you are, once again....on the outside drooling in….

See....there's a title....

....then there is a reading comprehension passage, that follows.



The bad news, you've utterly failed.
The good news?
Having achieved a zero, you have nowhere to go but up.

 

[PoliticalChic]

That's up to the USSC to decide, then. If they say it's OK, then it is legitimate, like abortion rights and Obamacare. It makes no sense the keep calling things illegitimate when the the court has already said it is. To say we're doing things unconstitutionally should be easily determined by case law. if it isn't, those saying it are wrong.

Clearly you are not conversant with the distinction between originalism and those who believe in a transformative purpose for the Constitution, a 'living Constitution.'

Only when Court decisions are authorized by the Constitution are they legitimate.

Case in point:
http://www.usmessageboard.com/law-a...berals-foreign-law-over-the-constitution.html

Regardless, it's the USSC that decides and once they do it is de jure legitimate. There's no further "only when" qualification. They're the judges.

I am conversant in "originalism" or "original intent" as it's often called. It's a false legal theory that presumes all the Founders were of the same mind. If they had been, they would have written the Constitution that way. Obviously, they weren't and gave us a Constitution that could be interpreted according to the times. Even Jefferson realized that you couldn't tie the people of the future to a document that couldn't foresee their circumstances.

Some men look at constitutions with sanctimonious reverence, and deem them like the ark of the Covenant, too sacred to be touched. They ascribe to the men of the preceding age a wisdom more than human, and suppose what they did to be beyond amendment... laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind... as that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new discoveries are made, institutions must advance also, to keep pace with the times.... We might as well require a man to wear still the coat which fitted him when a boy as civilized society to remain forever under the regimen of their barbarous ancestors.

Thomas Jefferson (on reform of the Virginia Constitution)

Did you know that in Jefferson quotes, very much like the Bible, one can usually find quotations to prove either side of an argument.


Now...as far as the Supreme Court deciding what is legitimate, Jefferson also distrusted the power of the judiciary, and strenuously opposed the idea that the judicial branch should be the final arbiter of the Constitution. Mayer sees Jefferson's views in this area as being colored by his conflict with the extreme judicial activism of John Marshall, but also as grounded in the principle of federalism. He envisioned an active role for the states in opposing unconstitutional federal actions, as is shown by his role in drafting the Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions in opposition to the Alien and Sedition Acts. Mayer says that "Marshall perceived the Supreme Court as a kind of 'guardian of the republic,'" while Jefferson "suspected that such an assumption -- that the Supreme Court knew what was right for the nation -- came too perilously close to 'playing God.'"
The Constitutional Thought of Thomas Jefferson

 

[konradv]

Clearly you are not conversant with the distinction between originalism and those who believe in a transformative purpose for the Constitution, a 'living Constitution.'

Only when Court decisions are authorized by the Constitution are they legitimate.

Case in point:
http://www.usmessageboard.com/law-a...berals-foreign-law-over-the-constitution.html

Regardless, it's the USSC that decides and once they do it is de jure legitimate. There's no further "only when" qualification. They're the judges.

I am conversant in "originalism" or "original intent" as it's often called. It's a false legal theory that presumes all the Founders were of the same mind. If they had been, they would have written the Constitution that way. Obviously, they weren't and gave us a Constitution that could be interpreted according to the times. Even Jefferson realized that you couldn't tie the people of the future to a document that couldn't foresee their circumstances.

Some men look at constitutions with sanctimonious reverence, and deem them like the ark of the Covenant, too sacred to be touched. They ascribe to the men of the preceding age a wisdom more than human, and suppose what they did to be beyond amendment... laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind... as that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new discoveries are made, institutions must advance also, to keep pace with the times.... We might as well require a man to wear still the coat which fitted him when a boy as civilized society to remain forever under the regimen of their barbarous ancestors.

Thomas Jefferson (on reform of the Virginia Constitution)

Did you know that in Jefferson quotes, very much like the Bible, one can usually find quotations to prove either side of an argument.


Now...as far as the Supreme Court deciding what is legitimate, Jefferson also distrusted the power of the judiciary, and strenuously opposed the idea that the judicial branch should be the final arbiter of the Constitution. Mayer sees Jefferson's views in this area as being colored by his conflict with the extreme judicial activism of John Marshall, but also as grounded in the principle of federalism. He envisioned an active role for the states in opposing unconstitutional federal actions, as is shown by his role in drafting the Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions in opposition to the Alien and Sedition Acts. Mayer says that "Marshall perceived the Supreme Court as a kind of 'guardian of the republic,'" while Jefferson "suspected that such an assumption -- that the Supreme Court knew what was right for the nation -- came too perilously close to 'playing God.'"
The Constitutional Thought of Thomas Jefferson

The Jefferson quote wasn't about the court, but about the Constitution itself. You were claiming it should have some fixed meaning and I was showing you that at least one of The Founders disagreed.

 

[NYcarbineer]

You are totally clueless. A democratically elected government can amend the Constitution at will. And there would be nothing illegitimate about it.

This is a common conservative 'argument'. How it goes, quite simply, is...

...if the Supreme Court produces a decision conservatives don't like, it must have been arrived at illegitimately. Conservatives have a habit of believing that by some miraculous process the Constitution of the United States coincided and continues to coincide precisely with the conservative agenda.

"...a decision conservatives don't like,..."

A fib.

I certainly don't like the ObamaCare decision, but predicted it.
And find it totally constitutional.

So in that case you are an exception to my rule.

 

[NYcarbineer]

[Did you know that in Jefferson quotes, very much like the Bible, one can usually find quotations to prove either side of an argument.

Then refute the Jefferson quote you used the other day, with another Jefferson quote.