Non Sequitur by Wiley Miller for February 05, 2011

Try as the lunatics might - they ain’t changing the constitution!

@comicgos: Well, not more than 27 times, anyway… ;-)

That Kate! Now ain’t she just the helpful one?

The last time I heard a screech like that, I had my brakes checked!

For those of us whose high school civics are a little rusty:

http://www.archives.gov/federal-register/constitution/

There is a 28th in discussion.

That screeching sound, better known as “the cold hard slap of reality” …

I like the fact that when they pushed the on button, the writers of the Constitution made it very hard to push off.

The Constitution has been nothing but a rhetorical device since Jackson’s Presidency. Since then, it has effectively been whatever the President, speaking for the ‘majority’, says it is. The two-party system has eliminated the independent judiciary by making sure judges need to join either the Jets or the Sharks to get anywhere above JP level.

Nabuquduriuzhur said, about 8 precedents ago: “True. That is what ‘activist’ judges are for. They just ignore what it says and do what they want…”

I assume that by this you mean such things as rewriting the 14th amendment (the one that was supposed to free the slaves) so that it instead freed the corporations to enslave us all… (actually, it’s unfair to say corporations treat employees as slaves… slave owners made sure their property got fed).

Of course, let’s not leave out the executive branch’s habit of rewriting laws that don’t suit them through the use of things like “signing statements” (first made public by Dubya, but enthusiastically embraced by Obummer). The Prez doesn’t like the law? He just writes up a signing statement saying “I’m not actually going to carry out this law; in fact, I’m going to do just the opposite.”

For that matter, let’s remember the petty bureaucrats who feel free to “re-interpret” the laws when creating the regulations that enforce them. Back in the Clinton days, for instance, Congress passed a small insurance reform bill, one that said your insurance company couldn’t deny coverage just because you participated in a slightly risky recreational activity like hiking, water-skiing, skydiving, motorcycle riding, snowmobiling, etc… The law was quite explicit: no discrimination in this area. The bureaucrats at HHS then wrote the official regulations in such a way as to explicitly enshrine the insurance companies’ right to deny coverage. Oops…

prrdh is, alas, right: the executive branch is treating the Constitution, and to an increasing extent the laws passed by Congress, the way drivers treat the speed limit, as nothing more than a suggestion.

Duped by overlooking due process. :D

Love the motion of their hair and the newspaper in the last panel

Glad to see someone point out that we are a nation that has both a Constitution and statutes and case law interpreting those statutes.

However, to say judicial activism started in the 20’s & ‘30’s misses the whole 19th century of activism that started with Mayberry v. Madison.

Most blatant judicial activism lately - the Citizens United case, which had been previous decided and settled law, then the SC requested a rehearing on points that hadn’t even been argued in the lower courts. Really? Really. That is the poster child for an activist court.

Same with the FL federal district judge ruling the entire Health Care Act unconsitituional. A judge is charged with striking down the portions of a law that s/he finds unconsitutional, but leaving the rest intact – not issuing a blanket declaration. Use a scapel, not a sledge hammer.

The politicization of judges is the final nail in the coffin of the Separation of Powers.

Nab:

Would you consider the Supreme Court ruling that corporations can give unlimited funds to political organizations an example of an activist court?

I’m waiting!

jcmckain, plessy v ferguson was settled law, as was brown v board of education, yet those “activist judges” saw fit to re-examine the underlying statutes and reqrite the decisions therein. What I see in the decision you quote and the ones I quoted is if any error is made, it is to err toward the side of freedoms and liberties acruing to the constituency, and away from the government.

If stupidity had to be ratified, so many Americans would remain in limbo.

You all forgot FDR who tried “stacking’” the SC since there is no number limit on judges. So please don’t pretend it’s only the judiciary’s fault when the execs are the ones who manipulate the placement.

So you folks are suggesting Danae save up her ammo and get a judicial appointment?

And I compliment us all on the civility of the discussion.

An “activist judge” is someone who rules contrary to my way of thinking.

they are now trying to say that “anchor babies, those born here of immigrante parents, are not citizens. Just goes to show that a good education does not guarantee that you are not STUPID

Just want to say that I love the exclamation points on Danae’s SCREECH!!

jcmckain said, about 6 precedents ago

However, to say judicial activism started in the 20’s & ‘30’s misses the whole 19th century of activism that started with Mayberry v. Madison.

Another famous bit of making policy that comes to mind is when Congress passed the Indian Removal Act (1930), which Jackson signed into law. The act was challenged successfully by the Cherokee Nation in 1832 in the US Supreme Court as Worcester v. Georgia. Despite the Supreme Court decision, Jackson took no action to uphold the Court verdict, and in fact would openly defy it; he was quoted as saying “John Marshall has made his decision, now let him enforce it!”.

Sandfan,

its not highschool civics because RIGHT NOW in my 7TH GRADE CIVICS CLASS were learning about the bill of rights

yesterday the entire comic is a pun -

“the right to ‘bear’ arms”

Reality strikes Danae like a bolt of lightning.

I don’t think the amendment concrning Income Tax (a “temporary tax”) was ever ratified by the proper number of States THEREFORE People have been paying to the IRS Illegally for years.

Sorry, Opie. It’s Marbury v. Madison, not Mayberry.

I would prefer the Mayberry style of life and law-upholding. Opie sure flourished in that environment.