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When the people fear the government, there is tyranny; When the government fears the people, there is liberty.  ~ Thomas Jefferson

 

Entries Tagged as 'Supreme Court'

Holder faces House Republicans over health-care law, ‘Fast and Furious’

December 8th, 2011 · Accountability, Corruption, Deception, Ethics, Government Control, Healthcare, Money Matters, Non-Transparency, Obama Exposed, Obama Nominees, Obama's Scheme, Politics, Selling Out the US, Supreme Court, Tax Dollars, Terrorism from Within, Treason

By Jerry Markon, Published: December 8

Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. clashed with congressional Republicans on Thursday, defending the Justice Department in the face of criticism of its “Fast and Furious” gun-trafficking sting and its refusal to turn over documents on the health-care law adopted last year.

Under exhaustive questioning from the House Judiciary Committee, Holder reiterated that his department would not provide Congress with more information about Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan’s health-care-related role when she was President Obama’s solicitor general. Republicans are seeking internal e-mails and other documents, arguing that Kagan might have to recuse herself from the court’s decision on the health-care law if she was involved in the legislation.

Attorney General Eric Holder says it’s inexcusable for the bureau to use a controversial tactic known as “gun-walking” in its effort to identify and prosecute major arms trafficking networks along the Southwest border. (Dec. 8)

Holder also was grilled over the Phoenix-based Fast and Furious operation, in which federal agents targeting drug cartels allowed guns to flow illegally onto U.S. streets and into Mexico. The operation led to a storm of criticism from Republicans, many of whom have urged Holder to resign.

The attorney general, who has resisted calls to step down, said the controversial Fast and Furious tactic known as “gun walking,’’ was “wholly unacceptable” and “must never happen again.” But he also condemned his accusers, saying the congressional investigation of the gun sting has been political and calling for cooperation in fighting firearms trafficking along the southwest border.

“Each of us have a duty to act, and to rise above partisan divisions and politically motivated ‘gotcha’ games,’’ Holder said. “The American people deserve better.’’

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Scholars debate whether time is right for amending the Constitution

November 29th, 2010 · Ethics, Government, Supreme Court

By Robert Barnes Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, November 28, 2010; 6:43 PM

Here’s how it went down on the Federalist Society stage at the group’s recent national convention:

The liberals urged caution, and judicial modesty. Trust the people and their elected representatives, they said; elections have consequences, and the political process is where policy should be made, not the courtroom.

The conservatives, on the other hand, called for revolution. Fight intrusive federal laws in the courts, amend the Constitution, form interstate compacts to defy laws from Washington, and – better yet – demand a constitutional convention.

It seemed a little jarring, coming just moments after Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) had stood on the same spot and assured the conservative constitutionalists that the recent election meant they had won.

Republicans are “serious” about either repealing the health-care plan from President Obama and the Democratic Congress or urging federal courts to strike it down, McConnell said. The era of expansive federal policies is over, he said. Don’t even think about trying to raise taxes, on anybody.

But the panel that followed – five constitutional scholars and a federal judge discussing “Enumerated Powers, the 10th Amendment and Limited Government” – questioned whether such issues of federal power should be entrusted to politicians. The 10th Amendment is the tea party’s favorite: “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.”

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In emotionally charged times, calls arise for impeachment of a justice or two

November 1st, 2010 · Accountability, Ethics, Supreme Court

By Robert Barnes – Monday, November 1, 2010

All across the country Tuesday, political incumbents are bracing for judgment from an angry electorate. So perhaps members of the Supreme Court should not be surprised that they are in somebody’s sights, as well.

Justices, of course, can’t be voted out. They serve for life, or as the Constitution puts it, “shall hold their Offices during good Behavior.”

But that hasn’t stopped calls from the left and the right recently for the House to open impeachment hearings for Justice Clarence Thomas, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justice Sonia Sotomayor.

None of the complaints is gaining traction, but they do seem to indicate a desire to do something about the court’s rulings or recent developments that some say violate testimony given at justices’ confirmation hearings.

“These are sulphurous times,” said Dennis Hutchinson, a Supreme Court scholar at the University of Chicago law school. “And the only stick you can wave at a federal judge is impeachment.”

He quickly noted that such demands almost never get very far.

The only justice ever served with impeachment was Samuel Chase, accused in 1805 of being overtly partisan. He was cleared by the Senate and served another six years.

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Kagan’s recusals take her out of action in half of the Supreme Court’s cases: A Waste of Tax Payer’s Money

October 4th, 2010 · Corruption, Deception, Democrats, Ethics, Federal Spending, Government, Government Control, Non-Transparency, Obama's Scheme, Selling Out the US, Supreme Court, Terrorism from Within, Treason

By Robert Barnes – Monday, October 4, 2010; 3:05 AM

Elena Kagan begins hearing cases as the Supreme Court’s 112th justice Monday morning. But anyone who wants to see her in action needs to be sharp.

Kagan will hear the first case argued before the court, then slip quietly through the burgundy velvet curtains behind the bench. She’ll be out of the action in all three cases : Tuesday. Her chair will be empty when the court returns next Tuesday and she’ll put in a half-day the next day.

Kagan’s old job as solicitor general – the “10th justice” – is initially making it hard to do her new job as the ninth justice.

Kagan, 50, has recused herself from 25 of the 51 cases the court has accepted so far this term, all as a result of her 14-month tenure as solicitor general, the government’s chief legal representative in the Supreme Court and the nation’s lower appellate courts.

The recusals are one measure of how integral the “SG” is to the court’s workings. Much of the court’s caseload comes from challenges to federal statutes or government policies that the solicitor general must defend. The court also often asks for the government’s view on whether a case is ripe for review.

Kagan is recusing herself from cases in which she had a role in drafting a brief for the Supreme Court, or when she was actively involved in a case in the lower courts. She took herself out of such deliberations when President Obama nominated her last May, so the pace of her recusals should slow as the court over the next few months completes the work of filling the term’s docket.

But initially, Kagan’s absence will affect some important corporate and employment- discrimination cases, as well as a highly anticipated review of one of Arizona’s attempts to crack down on illegal immigrants.

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Supreme Court ruling raises bar for corruption, fraud prosecutions as corruption rises

July 19th, 2010 · Congress, Corruption, Deception, Democrats, Supreme Court

By Spencer S. Hsu Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, July 18, 2010

A Supreme Court ruling last month that gutted an anti-corruption tool favored by federal prosecutors is jeopardizing high-profile investigations into politicians and business executives, including several related to convicted ex-lobbyist Jack Abramoff, according to legal experts and new court filings.

Since the June 24 decision, U.S. District Judge Ellen Huvelle in Washington has delayed sentencing for one close Abramoff associate, Michael Scanlon, and ordered the government to explain why the court should not dismiss several charges against another, Kevin Ring.

Legal experts predict a flood of similar litigation by defense lawyers based on the Supreme Court ruling. The court ruled unanimously that a 1988 federal statute that makes it a crime to “deprive another of the intangible right of honest services” is unconstitutionally vague. The justices limited the law’s application to bribes and kickbacks, which several former prosecutors say will make corruption convictions against members of Congress more difficult.

“I am worried about whether there is sufficient evidence to sustain an indictment with the new definition of bribery/materiality,” Huvelle told lawyers at a July 6 hearing in advance of Ring’s trial, scheduled for next month. She asked both sides to file briefs assessing the recent decision.

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High court nominees’ cautious answers frustrate senators: Something to Hide

July 5th, 2010 · Accountability, Deception, Democrats, Ethics, Obama Nominees, Obama's Scheme, Supreme Court

By Robert Barnes Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, July 4, 2010

It would be easy to come away from Elena Kagan‘s confirmation hearing with the impression that, in the minds of some senators, certain members of the Supreme Court might be — how to put this? — less than truthful.

Or, at least, dissemblers. The Senate Judiciary Committee’s 17-hour, 500-question grilling of the Supreme Court nominee was marked by repeated references from some senators to feeling burned by the three previous nominees: John G. Roberts Jr., Samuel A. Alito Jr. and Sonia Sotomayor.

“You know, we’ve become skeptical,” Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) told Kagan, because “it really isn’t going to matter what you said, because once you’re there, you’re there, and we have very little ability to change it.”

Coburn was criticizing Sotomayor at the time, saying her vote in a recent gun rights case was at odds with her testimony before the committee just a year ago. But he acknowledged his Democratic colleagues’ similar critiques of Roberts and Alito, who were nominated in 2005.

“You can understand the skepticism we might have, and especially in the fact that many on the other side of the aisle, the implication has been that the same thing by Alito and Roberts, that they weren’t straightforward, that, in fact, they didn’t keep their word on stare decisis,” Coburn said, referring to the principle of respecting the court’s precedents.

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Gun rights extended by Supreme Court

June 28th, 2010 · Government, News Alert, States, Supreme Court

By MARK SHERMAN – The Associated Press
Monday, June 28, 2010; 11:54 AM

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court held Monday that Americans have the right to own a gun for self-defense anywhere they live, advancing a recent trend by the John Roberts-led bench to embrace gun rights.

By a 5-4 vote, the justices cast doubt on handgun bans in the Chicago area, but signaled that some limitations on the Constitution’s “right to keep and bear arms” could survive legal challenges.

Justice Samuel Alito, writing for the court, said that the Second Amendment right “applies equally to the federal government and the states.”

The court was split along familiar ideological lines, with five conservative-moderate justices in favor of gun rights and four liberals opposed. Chief Justice Roberts voted with the majority.

Two years ago, the court declared that the Second Amendment protects an individual’s right to possess guns, at least for purposes of self-defense in the home.

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Civil rights organizations question nominee Elena Kagan’s record on race

June 28th, 2010 · Accountability, Deception, Democrats, Ethics, Obama Nominees, Obama's Scheme, Selling Out the US, Supreme Court

By Amy GoldsteinWashington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, June 27, 2010

On the eve of Elena Kagan’s Senate confirmation hearings, her record on race in the Clinton White House and at Harvard Law School is producing discomfort among some leading civil rights organizations, leaving them struggling to decide whether they want her to join the Supreme Court.

Their reservations have introduced the first substantive division among liberals in what has otherwise been a low-key partisan debate over Kagan’s merits to replace Justice John Paul Stevens. The uncertainty among some on the left is particularly striking, given that she was nominated by the nation’s first black president.

Decades after the height of the civil rights movement, questions involving race and ethnicity persist as a recurrent theme before the Supreme Court, and attitudes on those issues remain a significant prism through which nominees are evaluated by those on the left and the right.

The National Bar Association, the main organization of black lawyers, has refrained from endorsing Kagan, giving her a lukewarm rating. The group’s president, Mavis T. Thompson, said it “had some qualms” about Kagan’s statements on crack-cocaine sentencing and what it regards as her inadequate emphasis while dean at Harvard Law School on diversifying the school along racial and ethnic lines. Others have expressed reservations about Kagan’s views on affirmative action, racial profiling and immigration.

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No automatic deportation of immigrants for minor drug offenses, justices rule

June 15th, 2010 · Accountability, Homeland Security, Immigration, Immigration, National Security, Selling Out the US, Supreme Court

By Robert Barnes Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, June 15, 2010

Immigrants convicted of minor drug offenses should not face automatic deportation, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously Monday, a decision that could allow thousands of legal immigrants the chance to argue for leniency from immigration judges.

The court overruled the legal interpretations of the federal government and a lower appeals court in saying that Jose Angel Carachuri-Rosendo should have had a chance to make his case for staying in the country.

Carachuri-Rosendo, a legal resident who had lived in the United States since he was 5, was deported to his native Mexico after being convicted of possessing a single tablet of Xanax, an anti-anxiety drug, and serving a 10-day sentence. He had been convicted of possessing a small amount of marijuana a year earlier and received a 20-day sentence.

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Supreme Court rules out some life sentences for juveniles: Even “sexually dangerous”

May 17th, 2010 · Accountability, Deception, Democrats, Ethics, Obama Nominees, Selling Out the US, Supreme Court

By Robert Barnes Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, May 17, 2010; 12:05 PM

The Supreme Court ruled Monday that juveniles may not be sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole unless guilty of homicide, declaring unconstitutional a sentencing practice that has been adopted by some states but, the court said, was “rejected the world over.”

The court ruled 5 to 4 that locking up forever those younger than 18 who have not killed anyone violates the Constitution’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment. The decision follows the court’s 2005 decision that juveniles may not be executed and expands upon its decision that the Eighth Amendment must be interpreted in light of the country’s “evolving standards of decency.”

Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, writing for the majority, said states must provide juveniles who receive long sentences a “meaningful” chance to eventually show they should be released.

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