In another surprising move the conservative dominated Supreme Court rules on emotions rather than law continuing the practice of legislating from the bench.
Earlier this week they ruled that Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 that bans discrimination of the basis of race, religion, and sex also bans discrimination of the basis of being a member of the LGBTQ community. The issue really was not about whether anyone thought they should be protected, the issue was about the law and the law does not extend protection to members of the LGBTQ community in large part because in 1964 it was not an issue that had support or often discussed in the open. The proper way to fix that problem would have been for the Congress to change the law… A change that I doubt would have been challenged by many…
The Constitution is clear… ALL laws MUST originate in the congress… NOT in the courtroom… Not even the Supreme Court room.
The order today in essence further supports the idea than an Executive Order can have the same force of law. For months President Obama publicly stated that instituting the Dreamers Act would be unconstitutional but after failure to get Congress to act on passing a law, he breathed it into existence via Executive Order and for the first time ever the president that replaced him, Donald Trump, has been prevented from rescinding an Executive Order by a predecessor. I totally get those who are concerned and have sympathy for the tens of thousands of children that were brought to America by their parents who illegally entered the country. The argument that it they should not be punished for what their parents did has merit, but if we are to remain a nation of laws and if the Constitution is to mean anything at all the proper process MUST be adhered to.
The court didn’t actually rule on the legality of the DACA program, rather they said essentially that the Administration failed to consider the consequences… i.e., we don’t like the way you are doing things so you can’t do it… To hell with the law! Here is what the Chief Justice who sided with the liberals said:
“We do not decide whether DACA or its rescission are sound policies,” Roberts said. “We address only whether the agency complied with the procedural requirement that it provide a reasoned explanation for its action. Here the agency failed to consider the conspicuous issues of whether to retain forbearance and what if anything to do about the hardship to DACA recipients.”
This comes from the same judge impersonating a conservative judge that helped Obama pass the affordable care act by declaring the government can require us to buy anything as long as it’s disguised as a tax… They start with health insurance, next it will be a new computer annually, a new car, or a microwave… Just as long as it’s called a tax it’s all good… <sarcasm>
Justice Thomas, a true conservative judge wrote the main descent and had the agreement of Justice Alito and Gorsuch wrote:
“The majority does not even attempt to explain why a court has the authority to scrutinize an agency’s policy reasons for rescinding an unlawful program under the arbitrary and capricious microscope,” Thomas said. “The decision to countermand an unlawful agency action is clearly reasonable. So long as the agency’s determination of illegality is sound, our review should be at an end.”
I always say that no one person will ever make everyone happy all the time regardless of what side of the isle they are on conservative or liberal, but the one thing we should all agree on is that judges should NOT legislate from the bench… I’m fine with a judge coming to an interpretation that I might not agree with but this ruling is not an interpretation of law, it’s a decision that says we don’t like how you are doing things… That is not a decision for judges to make… That’s a decision for the voters make.
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