Congratulations

Spectrum Website
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We are on the precipice of a judicial moment almost 50 years in the making. So the story goes, in response to Roe v. Wade, groups of Conservative evangelical Christians banded together to take a bigger role in American politics. (I say “so the story goes” because the actual story is that they banded together to oppose racial desegregation and chose abortion as a more socially palatable public-facing issue.) The most prominent outcome of this movement has been White Conservative Evangelicals as the most stable voting bloc of the modern Republican Party.[1] But this movement considered one of its most important goals to be the ideological reformation of the court system. They understood that, as the final arbiter of our democratic system, the party that controls the Court controls the ideological direction of the country.[2] For the last several decades the Court has been mostly conservative, but there remained enough liberal balance that the movement was unable to overturn Roe v. Wade and was unable to stop some liberal gains.[3]

This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://spectrummagazine.org/views/2020/congratulations
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I’d think this is not the best outlet to congratulate Republican fundamentalists. Perhaps Fulkrum7 would jump in and actually celebrate this article… with whoever this guy is:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HXpKeB5I8kw

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Perhaps some “rights” that are not rights can be re-examined.

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Mind boggling. Consider the god the religious right serves: one that will burn you in hell forever and ever for rejecting him. Maybe the fruit does fall not far from its tree. I wonder if John Stevens is rolling around in his grave.

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With this sort of political tripe published in
SPECTRUM
I am prepared to never to donate to them again!
And I have been one of their longest and most faithful financial supporters.

Jason Hines,
Please be advised that there have been TWENTY NINE prior vacancies of a Supreme Court justice in an election year.
EVERY TIME, the sitting president has nominated a successor.
Why? Because it is his / her obligation to do so under the constitution.

A president is voted in by the electorate for FOUR years, not three or three and a half. Until the next Inauguration Day, he/ she has the full constitutional right to exercise his / her powers.

When the president and the senate are of the same party, the nomination has been successfully completed, as in seventeen of nineteen such prior times. When Obama nominated Merrick Garland in an election year, the senate was a Republican one — they had every right to refuse the nomination as has happened in eight of ten prior times when the senate and president were in differing parties in an election year.

We have a firm footing here with all the historical precedents—-—-so why the whining and hand wringing??

And we all know what stance Senator Schumer and Nancy Pelosi would take if the shoe were on the other foot! So this is sheer hypocrisy.

ELECTIONS have consequences. If Obama / Biden had not had such a failed eight year term, Trump would never have been elected, and as a sitting president be able to nominate SUPREME COURT justices when vacancies occurred.

And Jason , Trump’s election has been a triumph for the black community
The highest employment numbers IN HISTORY for the black minority.

Dozens of OPPORTUNITY ZONES to upgrade black ghetttos —— the Democrats have allowed the inner city slums to fester for decades under their political control.

Huge permanent funding for black colleges and universities —- which Obama ignored in all his eight years.

And prison reform which helped many black inmates — THE FIRST STEP ACT.

Trump’s closure of the southern border has prevented a huge influx of illegals all willing to work for less, to undercut black wages.

But Trump’s stellar action for blacks is his advocacy of SCHOOL CHOICE, which he will implement when re elected.
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The Democratically controlled teachers union and schools in Democratically controlled cities are huge failures. Nearly every school child in Baltimore public schools is practically illiterate — despite $13,000 annual expenditures PER PUPIL — the highest on the planet !

Black high school graduates in these cities cannot do simple math and have no job skills. The only option for these illiterate young black men is to become drug dealers or pimps!

So we do root for a great economy, a stelllar,stock market ( which benefits anyone with a 401 K or pension plan ) and super employment opportunities for blacks, Hispanics, Asians, and women as were the case before the Chinese plague hit us — and school choice to give parents better options than the failing public schools !

FOUR MORE YEARS !!!

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Should spectrum only publish articles favorable to your point of view?
That sounds like really good journalism!

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Such as the right to be free from religion?

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BOB,
It is not my “ point of view “.

As stated,in my blog, historical precedents, not my “point of view “ severely undercut all of a Jason Hines’ arguments .

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There is an absolute right to not have a religion or religious test imposed on individuals by the government.

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Good answer, Bart.
Where exactly is that right enshrined?

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Robin,
Do you believe those “precedents” to be facts?

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Amendment 1: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…”

Article VI specifies that “ no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.”

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Absolutely they are facts — well known and well documented !
Any google check will corroborate them!

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Thanks,
What if two parties disagree about the meaning of those articles, where can they go to get an ultimate opinion that would settle the disagreement?

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Ok, maybe Spectrum should hire someone to police those facts. You know, someone to put a stop to “alternative” facts.
What do you think?

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It is difficult to deal with a hypothetical question of this kind. It contains no concretes. I know you would like me to answer “the supreme court”, although the constitution doesn’t actually give that authority to the court; it was appropriated in Marbury v Madison. In my view it should have been challenged at that time. The supreme court is often and obviously politicized. Too much emphasis is placed on precedent rather than a plain reading of the constitution. Many precedents were decided on very poor or flimsy grounds and should be reversed.

Both the congress and executive members take an oath to uphold the constitution, though they regularly ignore that oath.

I would suggest that the appropriate venue for concrete disputes is with an informed jury whose job is to judge both the propriety of the law in question and then the facts of the case.

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Spectrum should be publishing articles on theology, and denominational or spiritual, or religious matters NOT politics.

Why ? Because the country was equally split in the last election.
So any political article is sure to alienate half their audience.
— not good when they rely on donations for financial support.

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Hypothetical applies to anything that could occur in the future. My point, as you so astutely foresaw, is if a dispute over the meaning of those articles came up, the supreme Court would quite possibly decide it if it came up thru the courts, correct?
So I wonder how a supreme court, divided 6-3 in favor of “conservative” justices, approved by the religious right, would decide that.
I agree, it’s speculative, but it nevertheless gives me much discomfort.

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Robin, that is a good answer. You seem to be saying Spectrum should filter out any political subjects. Ok.
I’d guess there are more than one person here that can see plain religious connotations here. I’d be disappointed if they were to do that.
EDIT: However if I am the only one here that believes this way, then I would see I have no place here.

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I share some of your misgivings. Part of the problem is that SCOTUS has grown too powerful, exercising both veto power over the other two branches and effectively legislating that which the majority thinks is the “right thing to do”. The best way to address the problem is to address the problem; limiting the scope of SCOTUS authority.

I don’t like ideologues on the court. Theoretically, the justices should be dealing with the original intent rather than that which it should be saying today. This obviously isn’t regularly observed. In general, conservative justices stick to the letter and intent, whereas the liberals do that which they deem best (according to what standard?).

Religious conservatives give me a queasy feeling in the event that they might attempt to impose their doctrinal views on the rest of us. Liberal activists tend to destroy individual rights in favor of “the good of the collective, sorry, society”. Both are troublesome, but in the broad scope of issues, the individualist rights wing (even if holding dogma in their back pocket) are far less threatening to objective rights than the collectivists. It would be helpful to begin some level of restoration of individual rights, starting with limiting the commerce clause to its original intent. The current rulings on that clause have caused the explosion of governmental authority and size unimaginable in the past. Perhaps as much as 70% of the scope and expenditure of the Federal Gov. emerge directly from a misinterpretation of the commerce clause.