Redstate

Roy Moore provides an opportunity for a "Sista Souljah" moment for the GOP.

When Bill Pryor voted to shut him down on the federal appeals court.

Bill Pryor - who believes in the rule of law - is my kind of conservative.

Roy Moore - a media whore of Sheehan-proportions - is not.

Yet another reason to have Bill Pryor on a higher court.

much as David Duke was (albeit for different reasons; I am not imputing racism to Moore). Most people will not hold a looney-tune like Moore against the GOP, and I will predict his gubernatorial ambitions will ahve about as much success as Don Quixote had against the windmill.

that we have gone this long without a reference to everyone's favorite Mother of the Year?

To the subject: please remember that for his willingness to adhere to the rule of law, perhaps in spite of his personal convictions, a solid majority of Democrat Senators apparently believed that Bill Pryor was not qualified to serve on the Appellate Court.  Can't have a guy like that one step from the SC now can we.

To bring down the GOP. He's ONE guy, trying to wreak havoc in ONE state. The Republican party will go on regardless of what he manages to do down there.

By the way, and contrary to popular belief, Moore is not much of "a folk hero among conservatives and particularly conservative Christians." At least not in my experience.

I venture to say that most of us think he's a lawless nut.

I knew the full story from the beginning and Roy was right. This is a critical State's Rights issue.

He is mild mannered and polite from good raising and nothing in your diary refutes that. Also, I might add, he served honorably in Vietnam and is a brilliant legal mind and a expert with no peer on the establishment clause.

Looking for a fight? He exercised his rights against the ACLU who attempted to intimidate him from exercising them. The ACLU started the fight. Well, the US Sup Ct started it in 1947 with fellow Alabamian Hugo Black's misuse of Jefferson's separation of church and state quote from a letter and then engle v vitale, etc banning school prayer, etc.

Major installations are often done after hours to avoid disruption of work.

How long the monument stood is irrelevant.

Moore is most definiently a victim. He was right on the law but lost his job wrongfully for a higher purpose. The Governor of Alabama was wrong to not prohibit the removal of the monument.

Its not outlandish to display the Ten Commandments at a couthouse. It is outlandish for a federal appeals court judge to order a state court judge to remove the monument and to claim it is an establishment of religion.

Must Christians wait till they are physically persecuted? What precedes such persecution, if not a chipping away of rights such as this?

Love and humility means caving to the ACLU  and bad law? Did MLK show love and humility? I think so. But unlike MLK, Moore did not break THE LAW.

legal arguments below to Thorley

Are you a lawyer? I ask because your usually excellent posts indicate a knowledge that impresses me, and I am a lawyer. I also know and admire Bill Pryor from meetings at seminars here in Atlanta.

But he was right and wrong in this area of the law that has been so screwed up for so long, that not too mnay scholars are really very knowledgeable about it. Moore is. As is Alan Keyes. I have a long thesis by Keyes and Moore's book.

Sandra Day O'Connoris a particular villian in this area with her 7 and 14 point tests. The Constitution gave one test: does a law establish a religion and it only applied to congress. And even if we concede the application of the clause to the states, it still isn't an establishment.

A monument, paintings, etc are not laws, do not establish a religion or prevent free exercise. The monument did have secular documents on the sides, so even under the oconner test, it passes.

But Roy purposefully refused to make that argument or he would have won. He forced the court to only consider the right of a state to acknowledge God as a people.

God is not a religion.

Let me digress a little at this point. States were allowed and most did have established state religions until the approx 1830. All dis-established to attract settlers, etc. The US constitution ban on establishment was to a national religion only. The US Constitution did prevent a State establishment from denying free exercise.

Of course, states could also do anything related to religion less than establishment obviously. So long as free exercise is not impeded. Seeing and hearing the majorities acknowledgement of God does not prevent anyone from attending the church of their choice. jefferson's vision was that like minded local majorities faciliated the greatest apportunity for the pursuit of happiness. To make sure local govrnment not only doesn't contradict but also reinforces shared values.

The people have a collective right of free exerecise, not to mention free speech, which includes religious speech.

I'll continue below on the specifics of what was THE LAW that pryor, riley, moore and the federal court should follow and why moore was right.

When I go to court I don't want to live under Islamic Law.  Not even the hint of it.

I want to live under a law not biased by someone else's religion.

I am a very religious, church going person.  But the people of my Christian Sect were murdered, under the law, for their beliefs in England and here in America.

Leave religion to the holy places, not in the courts.  There is too much history that mixing the two is very dangerous to society.

So many  assume that the law was anything the lower federal court said. But I think they were wrong for several reasons. I do think that it was acceptable for Pryor to so consider it to be his duty at one level, but i do think he was wrong, but that the Governor had the duty to enforce the applicble law ultimately.

I think it is arguable that only the US sup Ct can order a state sup ct to violate state law in deference to the supremacy clause.

But ultimately, its a case of state's rights and moore's oath under the alabama constitution.

Riley shold have prohibited the fed ct from enforcing its order.

Its not the federal govt's business to decorate state court houses.

This same misinterpretation of the law is behind the school prayer and other cases that hav e produced the secular value free responsibility free schools.

tired

more  later

is right or wrong, public officials have a duty to obey the law. In fact, we all do, except in extreme matters which compromise our conscience. And you'll a hard time convincing me that anyone's conscience requires them to erect a multi-ton idol in a courthouse.

is the constitution, not a lower court federal judge no matter what he rules especially when ordering a state judge on the operation of a state court.

Nothing REQUIRED the monument. many things in courthouses aren't required but that are also not within the perview of the federal govt to prohibit.

This is case where we are now ruled by oligarchs. We are less free. Courts were never meant to be the superior to the constitution, free to say it means white when it says black.

I generally agree with Dignan's assessment of ex-Judge Roy Moore, but I don't see him as the downfall of the party. That's because even though both the Democrats and Republicans have extremists, narcissists, whackos, and other assorted misfits, the difference is that Republicans in general are more willing to dismiss their moonbats than Democrats are with theirs.

The Democrats' big problem with public credibility is that the public sees them as the party of Mama Sheehan, Al Sharpton, Michael Moore, etc.  This perception is correct because extremists are a large element of the Democrats' base, and "mainstream" Democratic politicians are thus afraid to alienate their extremists.

While Rebublicans have our own problems holding together a coalition with only partially overlapping constituencies of social conservatives, libertarians, and fiscal conservatives, none of these factions is dominated by the kind of extremists who would alienate other Republican factions, shrinking the GOP to minority status. Most people in each of our factions recognize that in a Constitutional democracy, the odds that anyone is going to get exactly the outcome he wants are slim to none; and the odds there will be some government policy that he just knows is flat wrong is a near certainty.

There are a few ideas that have almost unanimous support among Republicans, holding us together and to a large degree distinguishing us from Democrats, e.g. supporting an aggressive military posture and unapologetic diplomacy not subject to European approval, believing American nationalism should stir our hearts more than pride in our particular ethnic heritages.

Belief in a government of laws, not of men, is another unifying Republican principal; wheras Democrats think wise leaders should construe the law in whatever way convenient for what they feel is morally desirable.  As evidence, see how upset the Republican base is (all factions) when Bush nominates someone to the Supreme Court with questionable commitment to the rule of law. Results-oriented suggestions that Miers will vote to overturn Roe because she's pro-life (rather than because of legal fidelity) don't mollify many Republican critics.

Democrats were reluctant to firmly oppose SF Mayor Gavin carrying out gay marriages in defiance of the law, because that would antagonize the extremists that Democrats depend on. That tolerance for lawless politicians contributed to the Democrats' image as a party of idiots (even among some people who favor legalizing gay marriage).

Idiots make up a smaller percentage of our Republican base than of the Democrats, so Republicans are not afraid to recognize Roy Moore as a lawless nut. That difference between us and the Democrats is the reason Roy Moore will NOT be the downfall of the GOP.

gamecock argues that Roy Moore is not a lawless crackpot, because he believes a correct interpretation of the Constition would allow the Ten Commandments monument as the obvious central focal point of the court rotunda.  That ignores the obvious fact that our legal system holds that even if people are thoroughly convinced that a court ruling is mistaken, they are still legally required to comply with that court ruling.

For interpreting federal law (here the U.S. Constitution), a federal judge's ruling is as binding on state officials as on anyone else.  A federal judge ruled that the U. S. Constitution requires that Roy Moore must remove the Ten Commandments monument. Moore's appeals of that ruling were rejected, including by the U.S. Supreme Court.

Question for gamecock:

When Roy Moore still refused to comply with the Federal court order to remove the Ten Commandments monument, even after the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the order, was Roy Moore disobeying the law?

Hint: This is NOT the same question as whether you believe the U.S. Supreme Court made a mistake upholding the order. Itis NOT the same question as whether you believe it was morally right for Roy Moore to disobey the law in this case.

Judge Roy Moore is the kind of narcissist that Democrats would love if he was indulging his lawless inclinations for their side.

Interesting bio article in the Atlantic on Roy Moore.

Roy and His Rock

www.theatlantic.com/doc/200510/roy-moores-ten-commandments

the law schools (which teach a lot of BS as law), courts, legislatures or even the President says or does. We are endowed with inalienable rights from God, not man. And the first is the right to govern ourselves and freely practice our religion and freely speak, all of which the judicial usurpers have taken away.

Is it THE LAW if the court determines that it is establishment of religion to speak jesus's name?

Better, is there any order you can imagine that the court could issue that a governor could and should refuse to obey?

or must we obey ANY order? any order against non-christian displays in courthouses? any ruling on anything? if so

then your point is vacuuous

the supreme court is bot the supreme law of the land by the way. the constitution is.

and the court is not superior to congress or the president. all are bound by it and sworn to it and can exercise power under it.

The governor should have refused to obey and out the ball would have been in Bush's court!

we didn't break away from britaiin and thei r established church to be oppressed by a national secularist church than bans free speech.

and true non christian civil rights defenders should defend moore

what if  we caught bin laden and a court ordered him released?

what if a defeated former enemy defied a peace treaty and was poised for war against the georgia militia and the president ordered the defeated nation removed from georgia to prevent war, and a court told him he couldn't? jackson exercised his inherent power as the executive commnader in chief

living constitutions cannot produce dead court orders

see what i mean

a court that makes up law that violates the law that restrains it

loses its moral authority to have its orders considered any more authoritative

ir=ts called tyranny

law not biased by religion

its called communism

100 million dead

more than all the deaths in all the religious wars in history

but if you want to remove all vestiges of religion, religious speech from the public suare and impose a secular atheistic scociety,then voter for it

free speech means all speech

and liberty means we make our laws thu elctions

displays of monuments that reflect the peoples values and history do not violate anyones rights

so past murders by professing christians makes christ's message and the principles ourfreedoms came from, unworthy to spoken of except beahund closed doors

The Constitution is the law no matter what the law schools (which teach a lot of BS as law) ...

I agree wholeheartedly with that part of your statement. I only used the subject "What law school says SCOTUS not binding?" because you had cited your status as a graduate of one.

must we obey ANY [Supreme Court] order? any order against non-christian displays in courthouses? any ruling on anything? if so then your point is vacuuous

That depends. If, as I believe, our current civil society is worth preserving, and the way we settle these strongly felt conflicts is through debate and elections (which also determine court appointments), the answer is yes, we must obey the court order we strongly disagree with.

The time you decide that it's right to defy the legal system of our society, is the time that you decide that our civil society is so corrupt that it needs to be overthrown. This is what is commonly known as revolution, in the literal not figurative sense. The defenders of any civil society will use force against those who don't accept our civil society's rules for settling strongly felt disagreements, because the revolutionaries have declared themselves not part of the social compact for peacefully resolving such disputes.

If Earth Firsters bombing construction sites or abortion clinic bombers believe that their cause is more important than preserving our America's legal system for settling such disputes democratically, their "moral logic" isn't inherently flawed, but people who think our Constitutional order is worth preserving must use force to defend it against such people, regardles of their opinions on abortion or development in environmentally sensitive areas.

the supreme court is bot the supreme law of the land by the way. the constitution is.

True, but the Supreme Court is the mechanism the constitution created for settling disputes on what the proper interpretation is. If our legal philosophy is that everyone is legally entitled to do anything they want as long as they claim that's how they personally interpret the law or constitution, there's no point in having courts; whoever can win the fist fight or gun fight will have his way, no matter how the court rules on a dispute.

we didn't break away from britaiin and thei r established church to be oppressed by a national secularist church than bans free speech.

That's an example when we decided the civil order of British rule was so flawed, it was worth resorting to lawlessness, inevitably leading to violence. I've got lots of gripes against my governments, including some big gripes, but not bad enough to decide a Revolutionary War is preferable to our current system for settling differences of opinion.

A tangent in anticipation of possible criticism:

A partial exception to my position that we should obey court orders is civil disobedience, where you disobey the law but agree that you must suffer the legal sanctions for that defiance as acceptance of the legitimacy of American civil society. Martin King is an obvious example, using his punishment for disobeying unjust laws  to rally support for repealing the injustice (regardless whether legislatures representing the majority wrote unjust laws, or courts interpreted the law illogically). Civil disobedience is legitimate for a private citizen like Rev. King, but for a judge who's primary duty is to uphold the law, it's an abuse of power that assaults Constitutional democracy. If SF Mayor Gavin Newsom or Roy Moore want to use civil disobedience to advance the causes they find so morally compelling, they should resign from public office and do it as private citizens.

Note: Both Mayor Newsom and Judge Moore believed their violation of the law (as interpreted by the relevant courts), by performing gay marriages and making the Ten Commandments the center of the court rotunda, was the proper interpetation of the Constitution.

Yes sir (or ma'am)

I think the Governor should have defied the court order based on state's rights and Bush would have had to make a choice. I do not favor an armed revolution against a decision by the president to send in the troops. But I do believe this asault on free speech and freedom of the majority in a state to exercise their religion by acknowledging God is important enough to force the executive to concur with the court. The court is not the ONLY mechanism for settling disputes. The constitution makes the executive the ultimate mechanism in this regard. The president could choose not enforce a ruling he deems un constitutional.

agree?

This is a step before armed revolution which I'm not yet ready to undertake!!

Moore has, like MLK, heroically suffered the consequences. And voters that agreed with Moore have helped to elect Bush and a GOP congress in hopes of restricting court jurisdiction, changing judges or having a President that won't defy state's rights.

great points and would love your response

I see your support for Roy Moore using his government office to disobey a legally binding ruling of the U.S. Supreme Court doesn't extend to armed revolution. It's more like reducing our country, or at least Alabama, to the political status of a banana republic.

Fortunately Alabama had adults in its government, like then Attorney General William Pryor (Republican), who don't want to return Alabama to its banana republic days of Gov. Wallace standing in the school house door in defiance of a court order, requiring the National Guard to impose compliance with the law on a Governor sworn to uphold the law.

I think the Governor should have defied the court order based on state's rights and Bush would have had to make a choice.

You're mistaken to think Bush would have seen any choice. He takes his oath as our chief law enforcement officer seriously, and would have treated Alabama's hypothetical lawlessness just as surely as when Governor Wallace played such games. Fortunately this was unnecessary, because Alabama officials followed their oaths to  uphold the law and disposed of Roy Moore themselves.

Whatever my criticisms of Bush rolling over for the Democrats on the Miers nomination, I know he's not like that old ethnic cleanser Andrew Jackson of "The Supreme Court has made it's decision, now let them enforce it" fame. Or as Stalin might have put it, "How many divisions does the Supreme Court have?"

Alabama Attorney General Pryor (now U.S. Appeals Court judge) understood the stakes when he explained, "I did not prosecute the chief justice [Roy Moore] for the Ten Commandments. I prosecuted the chief justice because he refused to obey a court order from a federal district court that had been affirmed by the court of appeals and the Supreme Court of the United States had decided not to review."

The Georgia militia was poised to take up arms against the Cherokee for ignoring private property in defiance of a peace treaty. Jackson removed them to prevent massive loss of Cherokee life.

Your post prior to this one was very impressive, and rather than insults, I had hoped you would have expanded on my questioning of:

"True, but the Supreme Court is the mechanism the constitution created for settling disputes on what the proper interpretation is. If our legal philosophy is that everyone is legally entitled to do anything they want as long as they claim that's how they personally interpret the law or constitution, there's no point in having courts; whoever can win the fist fight or gun fight will have his way, no matter how the court rules on a dispute."

You agree that that art 3 does not include the words

"disputes on what the proper interpretation is."

adon't you? and that Lincoln also defied the court. And that presidents have refused to enforce court orders directed to states that were defied by the state governments.

agreed?

Don't you agree that all 3 branches have an obligation to uphold the constitution and that the supreme court was not intended to have such power given the federalist papers and the text of art 3?

was also ready to give a licking to you Palmetto Staters the first time you started making trouble, as I recall. ;-)

It would really have been ironic if a SC native had prosecuted the Civil War started by SC. If he had, I imagine the war would have been shorter. I doubt he would have indulged McClellen for long or any 1820's equivalent.

In response to my claim that "the Supreme Court is the mechanism the constitution created for settling disputes on what the proper interpretation is [of U.S. law and Constitution]," you said:

You agree that that art 3 does not include the words "disputes on what the proper interpretation is." adon't you?

If you have some creative defintion of the Constitution's "judicial Power" that allows otherwise, be my guest:

Article. III.

Section. 1.

The judicial Power of the United States, shall be vested in one supreme Court, and in such inferior Courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish. ...

Section. 2.

Clause 1: The judicial Power shall extend to all Cases, in Law and Equity, arising under this Constitution, the Laws of the United States, and Treaties ...

inferred when one looks at the federalist papers and sees that this interpretation was specifically rejected which was the reason for the jeffersonian outrage at the Marbury case, and his the fulfilled of oligarchical judicial tyranny.

Good answer but for...

But, can you imagine a ruling that a president should not enforce?

Because it has occurred from time to time.

Do you disagree with every presidential decision in history to defy a court order?

Of course, you understand that the Moore case was very helpful in crystalizing the issue of the runaway courts legislating from the bench and helped win votes for Bush?

Look, I'm a lawyer and I respect and rever the courts, and I know what I suggest seems extreme now. But it was not always so. You also know of congresses power re jurisdiction. And the current state of affairs could have been thwarted if congress and the president did  not allow the judicial takeover to remove issues for which they would have to take a stand and risk voter alienation.

Just looking for answers. I don't want a theocracy at all. But the operation of the est clause before engle v vitale was just fine, agree?