And what, exactly, is underway to transform America into a "subordinate state"?
.
So heartwarming
to see you, finally, seeking an education.
And, here it is:
1. In his book Coercing Virtue: The Worldwide Rule of Judges, Judge Bork tells this tale of the American Bar Associations 2000 meeting in London, which included attendance of four Supreme Court Justices. A London barrister accused the Supreme Court of turning its back on the Continent, complaining that the justices rarely cite the decisions of European courts. Of course, many
American lawyers began effusively apologizing. But Justice Kennedy did not succumb to this combination of insolent foreign browbeating and pusillanimous American response.
a. Kennedy proclaimed that if US courts cede authority to remote foreign courts there is a risk of losing the allegiance of the people.
2. If only Kennedy was a man of his word! Kennedy wrote the majority in Roper v. Simmons, 543 U.S. 551 (2005) in which the Supreme Court of the United States held that it is unconstitutional to impose capital punishment for crimes committed while under the age of 18.
Kennedy referred favorably to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, and the International Convent on Civil and Political Rights. He also cited an European Union brief. He excused himself by that these were not controlling, but the Court has referred to the laws of other countries and to international authorities as instructive for its interpretation of the Eighth Amendments prohibition of cruel and unusual punishments.
Roper v. Simmons - 03-633 (2005) :: Justia US Supreme Court Center
3. In a blistering dissent, Scalia, Rehnquist and Thomas wrote: I do not believe that approval by other nations and peoples should buttress our commitment to American principles any more than
disapproval by other nations and peoples should weaken our commitment. More importantly,
foreign sources were being cited not to underscore our fidelity to the Constitution or to the American heritage, but rather to set aside the centuries-old America practice- a practice still engaged in by a large majority of the relevant states- of letting a jury of 12 citizens decide whether, in a particular case, youth should be the basis of withholding the death penalty.
ROPER V. SIMMONS
4. In the last few years,
Kennedy, Breyer, Ginsburg, OConnor and Stevens have all invoked foreign law in making decisions and filing dissents.
Fonte, Sovereignty or Submission, p. 110.
a. In 2003,
Breyer, Ginsburg, and OConnor met with French president Chirac to discuss French views on the death penalty. This, as the French were a prime mover on the Council of Europe with the announced intention of abolishing capital punishment in the United States.
Multilateralism comes to the courts > Public Interest > National Affairs
b. In Grutter, Justice Ruth Bader
Ginsburg (joined by Justice Stephen Breyer) cited both the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (which the United States has ratified) and the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (which it has not) as evidence of an international understanding of the office of affirmative action. In Justice Ginsburgs view, these international conventions provide the grounds for temporary special measures aimed at accelerating de facto equality. Ibid.
c. In Lawrence, Justice Anthony Kennedy prominently recurred to a friend-of-the-Court brief on foreign law and court decisions
filed by Mary Robinson, the former U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, and to a key decision of the European Court of Human Rights. Ibid.
5. So
we see the Liberal regularly attempting to marginalize American law and American history.
a. Need more proof? See Breyers dissent in Prinz v United States,
touting European concepts over American. And in Knight v.Florida, he quotes India and even Zimbabwe.
