Precisely my point, smartypants. Even the framers allowed for amendments, because they knew they couldn't possibly get everything right the first time around.

You mention Roe as an example of "where the court imposed its own views of the way things "should be" to overturn long-standing law and tradition". I would say that the Jim Crow laws in the South were classifiable "long-standing law and tradition", but it doesn't mean that they were right--morally or constitutionally.

Texas Pete basically argues that we do not need a Supreme Court.

He also claims that the issues are easy, not hard.

Of course, the issues are no longer hard, because this Court no longer seeks to balance interests (which IS hard).

We sure as heck do not need THIS court!

Both in your earlier post about "finding rights" and in this one about "every conceivable event" you are missing a core piee of understanding about the US Constitution. The US Constitution is fundamentally a document that in a very limited manner, enumerates the actions THE GOVERNMENT can take. Originally that was restricted primarily to the Foederal Government, but with the 14th Amendment, it pretty much applies to ALL governments - state and local included.

And in essence what this means is that ALL RIGHTS exist, except for those explicitly surrendered to the Government. Thus if The Government wants to exert a right to regulate reproduction - it needs to show traceability to an authorizing clause in the US Constitution, and to show that such a trace does not violate any of the explictly listed "no go" areas.

So yes, pretty much unless there is an explicit authorizing clause in the US Constitution, you need an amendment to allow The Government to regulate things like abortion.

Now I suspect that your comments about "what the law should be" were intended to apply more to Roe than to Scalia's bending of the Commerce Clause in Raich. So I doubt you will actually agree

Roe wasn't an imposition of views. If anything, the flaws in Roe are that it failed to apply the XIII Amendment's explicit and absolute prohibition against involuntary servitude no matter what the outcome on anyone elses "life".

AND, more importantly, in playing around with concepts like "privacy right" it failed to underscore that no-where in the US Constitution is there ANY authorizing clause that enables The Government to regulate reproductive rights.

So your reading of Roe is very very badly mistaken in how the US Constitution is constructed.

[And in essence what this means is that ALL RIGHTS exist, except for those explicitly surrendered to the Government. Thus if The Government wants to exert a right to regulate reproduction - it needs to show traceability to an authorizing clause in the US Constitution, and to show that such a trace does not violate any of the explictly listed "no go" areas.]

Now hold on. The Supremes didn't shoot down a FEDERAL law regulating abortion in Roe. They invalidated STATE laws. In essence, they federalized an issue that rightly belonged to the states to regulate. You got this exactly backwards.

[kygirl93 wrote the following post at 06-25-2007 1:44 PM: You mention Roe as an example of "where the court imposed its own views of the way things "should be" to overturn long-standing law and tradition". I would say that the Jim Crow laws in the South were classifiable "long-standing law and tradition", but it doesn't mean that they were right--morally or constitutionally.]

True. But then again, Jim Crow was overturned by legislation, not the courts. Because blacks and their white supporters convinced the elected branches of government that the law as currently practiced was unjust. That's the way it should be done, and that's precisely the right the SC takes away from us every time it imposes its extra-constitutional views on the public.

kygirl93:

Precisely my point, smartypants. Even the framers allowed for amendments, because they knew they couldn't possibly get everything right the first time around.

But my point is that it is not the judiciary's job to decide when we the people got it right or not. Unless a law is a clear violation of the plain reading of the constitution, it should not be invalidated. If the constitution needs changed, that's our job, not theirs.

You say the legislative branch overturned Jim Crow? Brown v. Board of Ed desegregated public schools. Katzenbach v. McClung desegregated privately owned businesses.

Question for all you proponents of maximum latitude for the Supremes. What do you think of THIS case?

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Bama:

You say the legislative branch overturned Jim Crow? Brown v. Board of Ed desegregated public schools. Katzenbach v. McClung desegregated privately owned businesses.

Well, Katzenbach was as a result of enforcing the Civil Rights Act of 1964, not a court "finding" a right that previously didn't exist.

Brown vs Board was a reversal of a previous decision, you are right. It did overturn long tradition in the south without preceding specific legislative action. But it was hardly the sweeping declaration that Roe was. And at least "equal protection under the law" are the actual words of the constitution. Roe was derived from the implications of the prenumbras, and even as others here admit, badly decided.

Yes, Katzenbach was based on the Civil Rights Act of 1964, but prior to the Katzenbach case no Supreme Court case had found a basis for Congress to regulate a privately owned local business right here in Birmingham. It was a new application of the Interstate Commerce Clause. The result: the protection of individual rights.

The Founders feared that a strong Federal Government would threaten individual rights, and that the states would protect individual rights. They were wrong. The Civil War & Reconstruction, The Great Depression, and the Civil Rights Movement all prooved that the Federal Government, not the States, would act to help the people where the States would not or could not. And the Federal Courts were and are the best avenue to seek protection of individual rights.

In Alabama we are keenly aware of what the federal government, acting through the federal courts, can do.

[And the Federal Courts were and are the best avenue to seek protection of individual rights.]

What about our most important right of all: The right to direct our government via the democratic process?

Suppose the Justices are interpreting a law which reads:

"No vehicles in the park."

You would prohibit them from proclaiming what this law "should" say. Fine. Well, how else might they properly rule based on such a law, when there is no readily available "objective" determination