Interesting graphic about how fast America changes its mind over social issues. It's speeding up. Is this progress or the fatal end of the republic?
H*ll in a handbasket?
- Thread starter WATU2
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Interesting observations. Why would something that goes all the way back to prohibition and interracial marriages signal the end of the republic? I might kind of see some correlation if it were only talking bout recent events related to marijuana and same sex marriage. It seems like you are trying to get a rise out of supposed conservative closed minded posters about the issues of same sex marriage and such?
The only real news in this graphic is that the courts have usurped the power of the constitutional amendment process.
I can see where you might be coming from on same sex marriage, but on the other stuff? How does suffrage, interracial marriage, prohibition, & marijuana usage usurp the constitutional amendment process? Use of alcohol and marijuana were not thought about even remotely in the constitution. And suffrage and interracial marriage seem to me to be points of law which require definition by the Supreme Court, not a whole new constitutional amendment.
Powers not granted to the federal government are held by the states... If individual states wish to prohibit or permit an activity not specifically addresed in the constitution then they have that power... Until said law is in the constitution then scotus really has no power to judge it unconstitutional without stretching the very fabric of the law...
90% of the cases that the SC sees are regarding the constitutionality of the states' laws. That's why we have the SC so the right guaranteed in the Constitution aren't trampled upon. If the SC determines that Rhode Island's (fictional) law banning men in bikinis riding bikes down the sidewalk violates one of your constitutional rights then that is their prerogative.
Per Article 3 Section 2 of the Constitution:
The judicial Power shall extend to all Cases, in Law and Equity, arising under this Constitution, the Laws of the United States, and Treaties made, or which shall be made, under their Authority;--to all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls;--to all Cases of admiralty and maritime Jurisdiction;--to Controversies to which the United States shall be a Party;-- to Controversies between two or more States;--between a State and Citizens of another State;--between Citizens of different States;--between Citizens of the same State claiming Lands under Grants of different States, and between a State, or the Citizens thereof, and foreign States, Citizens or Subjects.
The U.S. Supreme Court overturned the Lovings' convictions in a unanimous decision (dated June 12, 1967),[18] dismissing the Commonwealth of Virginia's argument that a law that (unlike Virginia's) forbade both white and black persons from marrying persons of another race and providing identical penalties to white and black violators could not be construed as racially discriminatory. The court ruled that Virginia's anti-miscegenation statute violated both the Due Process Clause and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
In Obergefell v. Hodges Justice Anthony Kennedy authored the majority opinion and was joined by Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, and Elena Kagan. The majority held that state same-sex marriage bans are a violation of both the Fourteenth Amendment's Due Process Clause and Equal Protection Clause.
In Roe v. Wade
The Court declined to adopt the district court's Ninth Amendment rationale, and instead asserted that the "right of privacy, whether it be founded in the Fourteenth Amendment's concept of personal liberty and restrictions upon state action, as we feel it is, or, as the district court determined, in the Ninth Amendment's reservation of rights to the people, is broad enough to encompass a woman's decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy."...
The majority opinion allowed states to protect "fetal life after viability" even though a fetus is not "a person within the meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment."
The SC's job is to interpret the constitution and apply it to the our lives. State's rights only apply in cases where a law IS constitutional but is not enumerated to the federal government. If the law of a state is suspected to be unconstitutional it will be heard by the courts.
Interpretation of the constitution is an implied power and not an enumerated power of scotus.
When scotus has the power to make law based upon their implied interpretation of the constitution then they have the power to circumvent the legislature and the people and in effect transform our republic into the oligarchy that many of those who tout the power of the court seem to despise and warn of so much.
I am not debating the inequality or the morality of these issues.. Only that they lie outside of the courts jurisdiction and in the realm of the amendment process.
A change in the makeup of the court one way or another can change the implied interpretation of the law. Otherwise there would be no controversy over who gets the right to make the next appointment.
Once an issue is made concrete in the constitution then it is part of the legal fabric and not subject to most judicial whims.
When scotus has the power to make law based upon their implied interpretation of the constitution then they have the power to circumvent the legislature and the people and in effect transform our republic into the oligarchy that many of those who tout the power of the court seem to despise and warn of so much.
I am not debating the inequality or the morality of these issues.. Only that they lie outside of the courts jurisdiction and in the realm of the amendment process.
A change in the makeup of the court one way or another can change the implied interpretation of the law. Otherwise there would be no controversy over who gets the right to make the next appointment.
Once an issue is made concrete in the constitution then it is part of the legal fabric and not subject to most judicial whims.
So essentially if one agrees with any of these ideas supported by the supreme court(interracial marriage, suffrage, marriage between couples of the same sex, prohibition, abortion, marijuana use etc.) and they wish it were allowed, then you are saying they should move to a state that allows it, or help get a new Constitutional amendment passed. And in essence you are saying the supreme court should not make any judicial decisions on anything, unless it falls within the bounds of something expressly allowed or prohibited by the Constitution and all it's amendments.
I will repost this section of the constitution for you... because it isn't just 'implied' that they should interpret the nation's laws in regards to the constitution. It is clearly stated:
Per Article 3 Section 2 of the Constitution:
The judicial Power shall extend to all Cases, in Law and Equity, arising under this Constitution, the Laws of the United States, and Treaties made, or which shall be made, under their Authority;--to all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls;--to all Cases of admiralty and maritime Jurisdiction;--to Controversies to which the United States shall be a Party;-- to Controversies between two or more States;--between a State and Citizens of another State;--between Citizens of different States;--between Citizens of the same State claiming Lands under Grants of different States, and between a State, or the Citizens thereof, and foreign States, Citizens or Subjects.
The last passage was added with the 11th amendment.
The meaning of that section is:
The federal courts will decide arguments over how to interpret the Constitution, all laws passed by Congress, and our nation’s rights and responsibilities in agreements with other nations. In addition, federal courts can hear disputes that may arise between states, between citizens of different states, and between states and the federal government.
If the Supreme Court couldn't interpret the constitutionality of the laws made by the states, then what good would it be to even have a Supreme Court or a Constitution? The states could just subvert the freedoms enumerated in the bill of rights or the other amendments. If we had to pass an amendment for every social issue then the list of amendments would have to be miles long.
Per Article 3 Section 2 of the Constitution:
The judicial Power shall extend to all Cases, in Law and Equity, arising under this Constitution, the Laws of the United States, and Treaties made, or which shall be made, under their Authority;--to all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls;--to all Cases of admiralty and maritime Jurisdiction;--to Controversies to which the United States shall be a Party;-- to Controversies between two or more States;--between a State and Citizens of another State;--between Citizens of different States;--between Citizens of the same State claiming Lands under Grants of different States, and between a State, or the Citizens thereof, and foreign States, Citizens or Subjects.
The last passage was added with the 11th amendment.
The meaning of that section is:
The federal courts will decide arguments over how to interpret the Constitution, all laws passed by Congress, and our nation’s rights and responsibilities in agreements with other nations. In addition, federal courts can hear disputes that may arise between states, between citizens of different states, and between states and the federal government.
If the Supreme Court couldn't interpret the constitutionality of the laws made by the states, then what good would it be to even have a Supreme Court or a Constitution? The states could just subvert the freedoms enumerated in the bill of rights or the other amendments. If we had to pass an amendment for every social issue then the list of amendments would have to be miles long.
I should have stated some of my sentences with a question mark, because I was wanting you to clarify your what you were saying. If you do believe all the statements I made in my last post, I have some issues with that.(NCane, I am ignoring the remarks made by astonmartin, because as I see it, you do not agree with his statements about the SC's right to interpret the nation's laws in regards to the constitution. Please correct me if I'm wrong as far as your views go.)
As far as prohibition goes that should be exempted from the conversation because there was an amendment on Prohibiton, and then an amendment repealing it. Also suffrage should be exempted because it was defined in the 19th amendment.
And marijuana use has only been decided by the states so far, but it would seem that you are implying the use of ANY recreational drug should not be prohibited by the federal government unless there is a constitutional amendment stating this prohibition or allowance/right?
It seems obvious that you feel that marriage is a states right unless there is a constitutional amendment defining marriage, whether that be interracial, same sex, etc.
There would seem to me, to be a point of argument on abortion within the confines of your views. It would be a matter of who get these rights and when. Upon conception, 1st, 2nd, or 3rd trimester, or at birth would be the argument which the SC would have the right to make a definition of. This would give them the right to make a decision on abortion without a constitutional amendment.
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"If the Supreme Court couldn't interpret the constitutionality of the laws made by the states"
This indicates you don't. No one said that. Unless you were just going for the strawman.
This indicates you don't. No one said that. Unless you were just going for the strawman.
And I quote:
The fact is, the laws (made by states) pertinent to the issues being discussed (interracial marriage, abortion, same sex marriage) are in the jurisdiction of the court based on Article III Section 2 as I have now stated multiple times. The court has the right (per the US Constitution) to extend judicial power (i.e. constitutional review) to any grievances brought between a plethora of entities including, but not limited to, the people vs. the states (or in many cases the representatives of the states).
That is implicit in the constitution. It is in the SC's jurisdiction to pass judgement on those cases.
The amendment process is for (or has always been used for) passing legislation that has a differing operation from that of the constitution as determined by the Supreme Court. So the Supreme Court, looking at the constitution says (facetiously) "The 2nd amendment, as it is currently phrased, prevents citizens from having green eggs and ham." The amendment process is there for the citizens to say, "Well, we really enjoy green eggs and ham, so we're going to write an amendment that says we can have them and that negates any verbiage in the 2nd amendment that alludes to the contrary"
Perhaps the confusion is due to his use of the word "jurisdiction." It's unlikely based on the context, that he was saying the court doesn't have the authority to review the constitutionality of the cases he's referring to, only that within the limits of its power it should have ruled them constitutional. He's talking about interpreting laws beyond their intent. I think you're giving a civics lesson that no one is arguing about. Maybe I'm wrong.
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That problem works both ways... a lot of Democrats would argue that the second amendment has been interpreted beyond its original intent. Same thing with the semi-recent corporate campaign finance decision that campaign dollars from corporations are protected 'free speech'.
The Supreme courts job is to apply the constitution to its rulings. If one of the amendments so happens to cover a situation that wasn't its original intent, so be it.
The same could be argued about the 14th Amendment. The intent was to protect the citizenship and rights of former slaves. It is very difficult to argue that the intent was to allow people who entered the country illegally and who had a baby to claim that baby was a citizen and that they could stay as a relative of a citizen.
Many want to use "intent" like a light switch that can be turned on and off as convenient.
It is no accident that the First Amendment is free of speech and religion and the Second Amendment is the right to have arms. Those two were at the top of the list and there is an example of intent.
By the way, the 2nd Amendment was written by people who had just fought a war with a distant government using in large measure private weapons. The intent was to make sure that no one could take their arms away from them It says "the right to keep" not the right to have available from a militia armory.
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Honestly, about a third of the amendments have been applied to cases outside of their original intent. I don't really have a problem with it as long as the wording in the amendment is applicable to whatever grievance is put before the SC. Also, I believe that all amendments should be presented with equal importance, not just the first two. (Even though the last 6-7 are more along the lines of procedural than liberal)
I agree all of the Amendments are important. The first ten are considered the most important along, of course, with the 14th and suffrage amendments. Not all are of them are of equal importance. For instance, the Prohibition Amendment is not so important since the amendment that repealed it, except for historical significance. The presidential succession amendment is good, but we never made it past VP, especially since the VP can be replaced. My point was that most people writing a "to do" list make sure the things at the top are things that need to get done.
Getting an amendment is tough, it was meant to be. Any politician who says "I favor an amendment to..." is blowing smoke. We have all heard a large number of amendments talked about along with the big statue of an Indian in Tulsa or a hotel on the River. Some may have been good ideas, but the procedure is daunting.
No word goes into an amendment without a lot of scrutiny. Anti-gun ownship people like to hark to the word Militia. But there is another key word: "KEEP"
You have the right to KEEP a firearm. The following words were not spoken by Davy Crockett when he arrived at the Alamo, "Uh, I'm sorry you'll have to find us some guns. We left on Sunday and the Armory of the Militia was closed."
Getting an amendment is tough, it was meant to be. Any politician who says "I favor an amendment to..." is blowing smoke. We have all heard a large number of amendments talked about along with the big statue of an Indian in Tulsa or a hotel on the River. Some may have been good ideas, but the procedure is daunting.
No word goes into an amendment without a lot of scrutiny. Anti-gun ownship people like to hark to the word Militia. But there is another key word: "KEEP"
You have the right to KEEP a firearm. The following words were not spoken by Davy Crockett when he arrived at the Alamo, "Uh, I'm sorry you'll have to find us some guns. We left on Sunday and the Armory of the Militia was closed."
Honestly, I just don't care about the 2nd amendment, simply because technology has made it nearly impossible to hold a violent revolution in the country. Unless people start getting their hands on thermal / night vision goggles, drones, and military level aircraft, there will be no violent revolution in our country. Especially when we spend so much on our military. They might be bothered by a guerrilla insurrection on a similar scale as Afghanistan or Iraq but we won't overthrow the government.
The right to bare arms as a means for the defense of liberty died long ago, and it was the invention of tanks and drones that killed it, not lawmakers. Now it's just an excuse for people to go hunting even though in this day and age hunting has been made more or less unnecessary.
As I said, every amendment is important... the second is / was certainly important as a symbol of the right to rise up and overthrow an oppressive government... it's just not possible anymore (at least not through the means that the founding fathers anticipated)
I get what you're saying, but isn't there a line between applying the law to new situations that arise and simply writing your own understanding of morality into law through interpretation? Surely there's a difference between the court recognizing the internet as freedom of press, and the court say....using the 14th amendment to strike down anti-polygamy laws(which were in place when the 14th amendment was adopted) as it almost certainly will when it becomes a social cause. Abortion is an interesting one. The court could probably make the argument to extend protections to the unborn if it chose to stretch interpretation as it did with privacy rights. But the justices likely to be sympathetic to the pro-life argument are also the ones most likely to reject the idea of reading something into the document that's not there. I'd imagine 3 or 4 of the justices would just as soon leave it to states.
Tell me hunting is unnecessary when you hit a deer on the road. Believe it or not some people actually eat what they kill and if you are poor as dirt, everything you get to eat is a good thing. By the way, they had to bring back alligator hunting in some places because they were getting dangerous.
Now, I don't hunt because I don't care for game. I can do duck gumbo and deer chili. But you don't need an excuse to hunt. It's legal in season with proper money to the government.
You also have a right to protect yourself. I saw on the national news where an 11 year old shot an intruder. Of course this will provide two schools of thought. 1.) What's an 11 year old doing with a gun or 2) Shooting an intruder who might have killed him.
Agreed that the current arguments for everyone to pack a gun has little to do with the original intent. Now it's personal protection in day to day life which arises because we have more guns than people. Equipping teachers/ministers with guns would be have been laughed out of the Constitutional Convention. The irony is that its the "Originalists" who took the bait.
I would not doubt that in 1789 there were a few teachers who had a gun around in the Ohio Valley just in case a bear wondered along. Or maybe a hostile native inhabitant.
Yes, but that's not a problem in the Ohio Valley anymore. At least not in the same way it was in the late 1700's.
On the note about hunting, I see your point about euthanize an injured animal on the highway, but it's not a necessity, plenty of animals have been hit by people who didn't have weapons to end their suffering.
As far as the impoverished and hunting, it's not even that cheap to hunt anymore. You have the cost of the gun, the cost of the ammo, the cost of the permit, and the cost of your time in going to hunt the animal. And those costs generally go up the bigger the animal is. Also, you can actually hunt without guns. Lots of people bow hunt.
To be honest, I actually just bought a firearm and it's going to be used for the only purpose I can still see viable which is wilderness protection while I go hiking. But people in Tulsa, Oklahoma don't have the same Grizzly Bear problem that I do now in Wyoming.
You are kidding right? I'm not talking about putting a deer down on the highway. I'm talking about you are going 75 in the highway and six deer cross in front of you. You hit the last one. He may or may not need to be put down. If you were really in a astonmartin, the cost of repairs and towing are high. There are no longer enough wolves and cayotes to keep the deer population in check. I said you hit the last one, if you are lucky and not the big guy in front.
Second, the poor guy probably has had the same rifle a long time, he does need ammo but if he is that poor he takes a chance on the permit. He can keep his cost down by reloading his own ammo, also.
Oh, so you might see a Grizzly in Wyo. Good luck with that. You have about as much chance of being attacked by a grizzly as I do seeing someone bust through my door. Hope you bought a Dirty Harry sized gun or you will just piss a grizzly off. People always grant exceptions for themselves.
I don't get the difference on the first point? We're talking about putting an animal out of its misery right? I mean, ya it might need it, but if you can't do anything about it then you can't do anything about it.
As far as hunting goes, reloading is only cheap if your have all the equipment to reload. My cousin is a hunter and our family just bought him all the stuff you need to reload. It's by no means cheap. You could buy grocery store beef for quite a while before it added up to as much as you'd need to reload your ammo.
Lastly the grizzly bear... I don't really WANT to carry a gun, but the parts of the mountains where I want to hike are filled with bears. (The Wind River Range Specifically) I've seen large bears in the wild before and I want no part of startling one on a trail. It makes me a bit of a hypocrite I know... however if there were a ban on firearms I would gladly give my pistol up, even if it meant not hiking in the areas I'd like to anymore.
Total ban on firearms? Who is for that? The "slippery slope" keeps us from even doing back ground checks.
US politics swings from extreme to extreme (sort of like the stock market). We've gone from prohibition of alcohol to it being about our only acceptable social drug back to legalizing marijuana. From sensible control that the NRA helped write to the NRS's slippery slope. SCOTUS swings a bit back and forth as appointments change. Not sure how to compare Truman or Ike to Trump, but there is a pendulum in there somewhere (I hope).
Mass media and now the online all-the-time life seems to have speeded up the swings. Movements that used to take decades to take hold can now go viral and sweep the country in very short time frames. My guess is that most of on this forum are from a generation that did not grow up with the internet as a given, so it may be hard for us to appreciate how quickly the next generations of voters are used to moving their positions.
US politics swings from extreme to extreme (sort of like the stock market). We've gone from prohibition of alcohol to it being about our only acceptable social drug back to legalizing marijuana. From sensible control that the NRA helped write to the NRS's slippery slope. SCOTUS swings a bit back and forth as appointments change. Not sure how to compare Truman or Ike to Trump, but there is a pendulum in there somewhere (I hope).
Mass media and now the online all-the-time life seems to have speeded up the swings. Movements that used to take decades to take hold can now go viral and sweep the country in very short time frames. My guess is that most of on this forum are from a generation that did not grow up with the internet as a given, so it may be hard for us to appreciate how quickly the next generations of voters are used to moving their positions.
Okay, let's try that first point again. Deer have pretty much lost their natural enemies. Hunting keeps a balance where some become food and others have enough to eat. Surely you have heard the expression "Deer in the headlights." The more deer there are the more get hit by cars. The less food there is the more likely they are to come into mans area. They are fast and they come out of the bushes. You hit one depending on his size and your speed it can not only kill him but do some serious damage to your car. If the stars align just right and you hit a big buck...then. Often they come in small groups which makes it hard to avoid everyone of them.
So we are now pushing the second amendment for the population control of deer? I guess it's an argument. Honestly I'm not really against hunting... I'm just not under any delusion that a small rebellion of hunters with 30-ots will overthrow the US Military.
No one knows a solution. Maybe you should have to prove your intent before you buy a gun? Either with some kind of hunting permit, or in my case a permit for wilderness protection.
I'm certainly for fingerprint technology in firearms. It would be nice if you could assign a small number of registered operators to the firearm (mainly family) and if you could assign them over time, so a child couldn't accidentally fire a round when he's 3.
No firearms are not required for deer control. You introduced hunting, not I. I was not making a case for firearms but for hunting as a reasonable practice.
A firearm is a tool. If I buy and ax, should I state that I want it for camping or splitting firewood? How will they know that I don't plan to ax someone? Maybe I don't plan to when I buy the ax. Maybe later I change. I'm not going to state that I want to kill 3 people. Do I take a lie detector test? Bring a picture of my fireplace? The woman who killed people with her car at oSu doubtless didn't buy the car for that purpose.
There are let's say 250 million guns in this country. A decently maintained Enfield 303 from WWI will kill a person and with good luck a grizzly bear. So do we round all guns up? Do we require them to be brought in? Joe has always had his gun. Joe has no criminal record. Joe keeps it and gets caught, should he be guilty of a federal crime?
Mankind did an outstanding job of killing each other before guns. The desire to kill people out of anger, hatred, or for a cause or a religion is the problem. You mention bow and arrow for hunting. The English were famous for their skill with the longbow.
A firearm is a tool. If I buy and ax, should I state that I want it for camping or splitting firewood? How will they know that I don't plan to ax someone? Maybe I don't plan to when I buy the ax. Maybe later I change. I'm not going to state that I want to kill 3 people. Do I take a lie detector test? Bring a picture of my fireplace? The woman who killed people with her car at oSu doubtless didn't buy the car for that purpose.
There are let's say 250 million guns in this country. A decently maintained Enfield 303 from WWI will kill a person and with good luck a grizzly bear. So do we round all guns up? Do we require them to be brought in? Joe has always had his gun. Joe has no criminal record. Joe keeps it and gets caught, should he be guilty of a federal crime?
Mankind did an outstanding job of killing each other before guns. The desire to kill people out of anger, hatred, or for a cause or a religion is the problem. You mention bow and arrow for hunting. The English were famous for their skill with the longbow.
