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David, your missing the point of the thread here, the point is not if Michael Bloomberg has hurt me or anyone else here or even if we live in New York. the point is that the voters of New York twice voted for term limits for the mayor of your city, and the mayor and your city counsel usurped the will of the voters without asking the voters. That is a display to the entire country of how far a public official will go to hold on to the reins of power. If the people of New York decide to retain Michael Bloomberg then all they are doing is making a statement to future mayors that the will of the voters can be usurped at anytime at the whim of the mayor or any public official.
I would not have made this statement had the mayor gone to the city counsel and said, can we put a ballot proposal forward that will recind the term limits for mayor and done so long ago prior to the end of his last term. The fact that Michael Bloomberg has been the best mayor ever for New York means nothing in the face of usurping the will of the voters.
It does make him look stupid.
However, term limits are silly...we already have them, they're called elections.
This is a terrible idea. Federal judges need to be impartial and not subject to political whim.
My reasoning behind this is actually very simple, to keep Judges from becomming tools of one party or the other and to cut down on the tendancy of federal judges to legislate from the bench. Larkinn one need only look at the federal judicial system to see how impartial it is, while thats a noble idea it is not reflected in reality. Let me cite you still another example, you have a sitting president who makes several appointments to the Supreme Court, while those appointments may reflect the will of the nation at that time period it may not 25 years later, while some of these same judges still sit there. I don't suffer from the dillusion that the judicial branch is some how above any other branch of government. All branches of government should serve at the pleasure of the American people, these lifetime appointments and the arguement that they have to be there for a lifetime to insure impartial judgement does not work on me, as recent history has proven otherwise.
Damn, exactly how I feel.
I have issues with this. But honestly, I didn't like the fact that I couldn't vote for Bloomberg again because a bunch of people said "oooh...government... please stop me before I vote for the incumbant again....". And let's be real about the people who are complaining about this.... they either want to run for one of the (supposedly) term-limited out seats... or they have a horse in the race.
No one is clean on this. And, frankly, I'd rather have Bloomberg managing the city right now as much as I think what the council is doing is heavy handed and makes them look bad.
My reasoning behind this is actually very simple, to keep Judges from becomming tools of one party or the other and to cut down on the tendancy of federal judges to legislate from the bench.
Larkinn one need only look at the federal judicial system to see how impartial it is, while thats a noble idea it is not reflected in reality.
Let me cite you still another example, you have a sitting president who makes several appointments to the Supreme Court, while those appointments may reflect the will of the nation at that time period it may not 25 years later, while some of these same judges still sit there.
I don't suffer from the dillusion that the judicial branch is some how above any other branch of government. All branches of government should serve at the pleasure of the American people, these lifetime appointments and the arguement that they have to be there for a lifetime to insure impartial judgement does not work on me, as recent history has proven otherwise.
"legislating from the bench" is just another way of saying judicial review (something the right likes with regard to anti-gun legislation and hates with regard to anti-choice legislation).
What you're talking about is politics controlling what judges do. It's already bad in that regard. How much worse would it be if say a relatively independent judge (like souter is ... or sandy day o'connor was) were to be subjected to "political controls".
I disagree with you on this one. It's a bad idea and would remove even the possibility of impartiality. It's not the fault of the constitution that someone like scalia forgot his sworn duty in favor of politics.
jillian let me ask you something, do you think that Robert Byrd after 49 years in the Senate actually represents the people of West Virgina as a whole? Of for that matter what about John Dingle who has been in the House since what 1955 how much has he done for the his district in Detroit since he was elected? Or is it, that they are now just there as icons of the Senate and House doing really nothing other than holding a title. This issue is not limited to just the democrats its a republican issue as well. IMO if we hold the President of the Untied States to term limits then we should ask no less of any other branch of the Federal govt. especially those branches where appointments are involved.
I'm sorry I left you with the impression that for some reason I am in favor of something of that which I am not. Let's be fair here, though, this legislating from the bench is not something that is the exclusive property of the Supreme Court but look at some of lower Court decisions. If you want a liberal decision go to the 9th Circuit, you want a conservative one go to the 6th. What I am in favor of is limiting the time these judges spend on the bench in order to keep people like Scalia and Thomas and Ginsberg. It is not the job of the court to pass laws, but it seems that many in this country have lost what the actual job of the court is and many judges have also. IMO term limits would solve this issue in some respects.
I'm sorry I left you with the impression that for some reason I am in favor of something of that which I am not. Let's be fair here, though, this legislating from the bench is not something that is the exclusive property of the Supreme Court but look at some of lower Court decisions. If you want a liberal decision go to the 9th Circuit, you want a conservative one go to the 6th. What I am in favor of is limiting the time these judges spend on the bench in order to keep people like Scalia and Thomas and Ginsberg. It is not the job of the court to pass laws, but it seems that many in this country have lost what the actual job of the court is and many judges have also. IMO term limits would solve this issue in some respects.
How exactly would making judges subject to the whims of political parties and the people make them LESS of a tool to political parties? That makes no sense. And legislating from the bench is, as far as its seen in political circles, a myth. It does happen, but frankly people don't understand the laws well enough to know when its happened and when it hasn't. Legislating from the bench is just another term for "opinions I personally don't like".
Actually, it is. Its not perfect, but the federal judiciary has worked damned well and overall does a damn good job. I also really, really don't want federal election law to be decided by people who are subject to it via elections. That seems an atrociously bad way of doing it.
Not sure what this is supposed to be an example of...but so what? The federal judiciary changes slowly, I think this is a good thing.
It is above them because it lacks politics. It doesn't always get it right, and I definitely don't like the current court, but the court in general has done a very, very good job. This appeal to Democracy is foolish. California has done something similar with its referendum system, they decided that Democracy was the way to go and now tons of spending bills are passed via referendum. Well that ties the governments hands and now, voila, they have 7 billion in debt.
Texas v. White, 74 U.S. 700 (1869) was a significant case argued before the United States Supreme Court in 1869. The Court held in a 53 decision that Texas had remained a state of the United States ever since it first joined the Union, despite its joining the Confederate States of America and its being under military rule at the time of the decision in the case. It further held that the Constitution did not permit states to secede from the United States, and that the ordinances of secession, and all the acts of the legislatures within seceding states intended to give effect to such ordinances, were "absolutely null".
Thats just one of many examples of legislating from the bench, This case wass based entirely on the Articles of Confederation and not the US constitution. Want another.
Bush v. Gore, 531 U.S. 98 (2000), was a United States Supreme Court case decided on December 12, 2000. The case effectively resolved the 2000 presidential election in favor of George W. Bush. Only eight days earlier, the United States Supreme Court had unanimously decided the closely related case of Bush v. Palm Beach County Canvassing Board, 531 U.S. 70 (2000), and only three days earlier, the United States Supreme Court had preliminarily halted the recount that was occurring in Florida.
There are so many examples in the last 100 years I would not where to begin, however in the Bush v. Gore case you have a clear case of the Court stepping into what is clearly a state issue that the Federal court had ZERO jurisdiction over.
As for your assertion that "legislating from the bench " is " opinions I don't like" that is your personal opinion and bias and facts do not support your opinion.
Again your opinion vs. my opinion on the job that the Federal Courts do are completely different in that, I don't start from a point where, I look upon the courts as this all knowing body that is above the other two branches of government.
I see the courts as a reflection of the past administrations that have appointed them. They are nothing but political appointments lasting beyond the term of the administration that appointed them.
Judge Bell endorsed McCain for President because John McCain is a principled public servant with the leadership skills and credibility necessary to hold the highest office in the land.
He said -- and I'm going to paraphrase a little here: think about who I
am -- my father was Kenyan; I have close relatives in a small rural
village in Kenya to this day; and I spent several years of my childhood
living in Jakarta, Indonesia. Think about what it's going to mean in many
parts of the world -- parts of the world that we really care about -- when
I show up as the President of the United States. I'll be fundamentally
changing the world's perception of what the United States is all about.
He's got my vote.
JUDGE RON CHAPMAN, Retired Justice, 5th District Court of Appeals, 108
Ellen Lane, Trinidad, TX 75163;
So there are above the frey? Judges are no different than any other politcal appointee no matter how much you or I want them to be impartial they never will be. While I am completely aware that the Supreme Courts Duty is to rule on constitutional issues and decide on the merits of their constitutionality, it is NOT to inject or rewrite laws, that is the legislatures job. I am well aware of what the Supreme Court does but I am talking about all federal bench appointments not just the high court.
JUSTICE STEVENS, with whom JUSTICE GINSBURG AND JUSTICE BREYER join, dissenting.
The Constitution assigns to the States the primary responsibility for determining the manner of selecting the Presidential electors. See Art. II, Section 1, cl. 2. When questions arise about the meaning of state laws, including election laws, it is our settled practice to accept the opinions of the highest courts of the States as providing the final answers. On rare occasions, however, either federal statutes or the Federal Constitution may require federal judicial intervention in state elections. This is not such an occasion.
Bush v. Gore
I never said I knew more than a federal Judge nor assumed I knew more about the law than a constitutional attorney. However, on the latter I sometimes have my doubts. you claim on Bush v. Gore is not supported by the opnions of some of the sitting judges on the court, so by your reasoning, am I to believe your assesment or theirs? I tend to believe theirs as well as the constitution when it comes to the Tenth Amendment.
As far as Texas v. White I'm also aware of the minor consideration given to Article 4 however, the Articles of Confederation were the main reason why Texas v. White was decided.
The union between Texas and the other States was as complete, as perpetual, and as indissoluble as the union between the original States. There was no place for reconsideration, or revocation, except through revolution, or through consent of the States.
The assumption that for some reason, to use the words "legislate from the bench" shows a lack of understanding the legal system or that it's just too complicated for the lay person to understand while it may be true when the term is slung around by those who wish to have a decision go their way.
That is NOT the way I am using the term. I am using the term to illustrate that the court is indeed a political body and as such does legislate based on political views no matter how high the ideals you and I may want them to be.
I found a rather interesting article on a study done by the University of Chicago Law School " Are Judges Political". It's an interesting article to read and I thought you both might enjoy it.
Are Judges Political?
Are judges political? At least in some ways, this is an empirical question. Together with Tom Miles and a group of superb students, and as part of the Chicago Judges Project, I have been studying this question in an area where the answer might well be expected to be "no." But the answer turns out to be yes - if a somewhat qualified one.
The area is a bit esoteric; it involves judicial review of agency interpretations of law. Under the Supreme Court's decision in the famous Chevron case, courts are supposed to uphold agency interpretations of ambiguous statutes so long as those interpretations are reasonable. This principle -- which calls for judicial deference to agencies -- might well be expected to eliminate differences between Republican and Democratic appointees to the federal bench. But it doesn't. (An empirical paper on these questions, by Miles and me, will appear in the summer issue of the University of Chicago Law Review. A detailed paper on judicial review of executive decisions, mostly normative but also discussing the data, will appear in the Yale Law Journal.)
On the lower courts, we have studied all published court of appeals decisions between 1990 and the present, reviewing interpretations of law by the Environmental Protection Agency, the Federal Communications Commission, and the National Labor Relations Board. Decisions are generally coded as "liberal" if the agency decision is upheld against industry attack; decisions are also generally coded as liberal if the agency decision is invalidated as a result of an attack by a public interest group.
Here are some of our preliminary findings:
1. Republican appointees show significantly more conservative voting patterns than Democratic appointees.
2. When Republican appointees sit only with Republican appointees, and when Democratic appointees sit only with Democratic appointees, the gap grows -- by a lot. Republican appointees show far more conservative voting patterns when sitting only with other Republican appointees; the same is true for Democratic appointees on the liberal side.
The University of Chicago Law School Faculty Blog: Are Judges Political?
My friend lives in New York and said he is actually getting things done there! I don't know how I feel about him doing this but if it isn't broke why fix it!It isnt just that Mr. Bloomberg inched away from a position that he once cast as an inviolable principle. He did a complete 180. Were talking, of course, about term limits for the mayor and other senior elected officials, including the 51 members of the City Council.
As you know, New York voters twice passed referendums limiting those officials to two consecutive terms. No one benefited more from the plebiscites than Mr. Bloomberg. Without them, we might well still be talking about Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani. So supposedly sacred was the peoples voice to Mr. Bloomberg that he used to proclaim, We cannot ignore their will, and certainly not by legislative fiat.
But on Thursday, at Mr. Bloombergs bidding, a majority of the Council thumbed its nose at the voters and stretched the limit to a third term. The majority was unusually narrow for a Council vote, 29 to 22, reflecting the emotional, intellectual and political ferment over the issue.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/24/nyregion/24nyc.html
This is a digusting display of usurping the will of the voters and it is EVERYTHING that wrong with this country. The people we elect in this country serve US not the other way around and serve at OUR pleasure. This along with members of congress ignoring the will of the people on the bailout is just one more reason why term limits need to be enforced .
