'Equal protection'? Just protect the Constitution from the Supreme Court

An excerpt from Ben Shapiro

In 1866, when members of the 39th Congress of the United States submitted the Constitution's 14th Amendment to state legislatures for ratification, they would have been stunned to learn that they had just written a provision mandating that homosexual sex be treated on the same moral plane as heterosexual sex. On Friday, Oct. 21, the Kansas Supreme Court, ruling under the Supreme Court precedent of Lawrence v. Texas (2003), decided that the 39th Congress meant just that. A Kansas law penalizing statutory homosexual rape more severely than statutory heterosexual rape was struck down under the 14th Amendment's "equal protection" clause....

As the constituency of the Court has changed, interpretation of the Constitution has changed. The Court has arrogantly enforced its own morality. "Equal protection" is no longer a simple bar against racist law enforcement; it is no longer even restricted to race itself. "Equal protection" now means that any law classifying groups differently must meet the Supreme Court's moral standards. Of course, all laws inherently classify groups differently. Murder laws will classify murderers differently than law-abiding citizens. Such laws have always been constitutional. But members of the Supreme Court must now personally agree that legal classifications meet their own moral standards.

In Bowers v. Hardwick (1986), for example, the Court declared that a Georgia statute criminalizing sodomy did not violate the "equal protection" clause. Justice White, writing for the majority, explained, "In 1868, when the 14th Amendment was ratified, all but five of the 37 States in the Union had criminal sodomy laws. In fact, until 1961, all 50 States outlawed sodomy, and today, 24 States and the District of Columbia continue to provide criminal penalties for sodomy performed in private and between consenting adults. Against this background, to claim that a right to engage in such conduct is 'deeply rooted in this Nation's history and tradition' or 'implicit in the concept of ordered liberty' is, at best, facetious."

By 2003, a constitutional right to engage in sodomy had been discovered. What changed between 1986 and 2003 to bring about this reversal? Nothing, except the constituency of the Court. And so the Constitution magically changed. Personal politics of the justices trumped the fully constitutional will of the people. Nothing gives the Supreme Court power to overrule popular legislation wherever it pleases. The Constitution does not grant unlimited power to the Supreme Court. We live in a republic, not an oligarchy. No matter whether the Court considers the law in Kansas abhorrent or praiseworthy, it is none of its business under the Constitution. We must trust the people more than we trust tyrants. Anything less is tyranny.

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ELSEWHERE

Why can't those wonderfully wise Europeans get anywhere near this? : "The US economy strengthened in the third quarter, driven higher by strong government and consumer spending, and despite damage caused by hurricanes. Gross domestic product (GDP) expanded by an annual rate of 3.8% in the three months from July through September, the Commerce Department said. That compares with 3.3% in the second quarter and topped market estimates.... There had been concerns that the cost of rebuilding after hurricanes Katrina and Rita, coupled with record oil prices, would slam the brakes on growth. It now looks as if the US economy will keep motoring through to the end of the year, analysts said. "This is a very positive, strong report and encouraging because it included Katrina and a spike in oil prices and we still just seem to have a lot of momentum going into the fourth quarter," said Kurt Karl, an economist at Swiss Re.... Friday's GDP report also contained inflation figures that showed a decline in the core level of price growth. Excluding food and energy prices, the core inflation rate was 1.3% during the quarter, down from 1.7% in the previous quarter."

Another economic moron: "Senator Dick Durbin wants to impose a tax on U.S. oil producers, just at the time when they are struggling to get Gulf Coast gas and oil production and refining restored after being hit by two hurricanes. The plan by Senator Dick Durbin would impose a 50% tax on the difference between the market price of oil and a bench-mark of $40 a barrel. The result will be to raise $40 billion or so a year based on a price of $63 per barrel. This will retard the post-hurricane recovery of the U.S. oil industry and put a dead hand on future exploration in the United States. That, in turn, will keep the world price of oil at a level higher that would prevail otherwise and retard domestic economic growth. It will also provide more revenue for foreign producers like Saudi Arabia and Iran. I worry about how that extra revenue will be spent by the sheiks and ayatollahs."

Wal-Mart gets praised for shafting its competition! "H. Lee Scott, Jr., the CEO of Wal-Mart, surprised many by calling for an increase in the minimum wage. And what accolades were heaped on him! The company was even cast in a new role, from the exploiter of workers to the responsible advocate of pro-worker policies. And how selfless, for who has to pay such higher wages but companies like Wal-Mart? And thus do we see a corporation set aside its business interests on behalf of the long-term interests of society. The whole thing befuddled Wal-Mart haters as much as it disgusted its free-market defenders. Ted Kennedy wouldn't go so far as to praise the company, but he did say that 'If the CEO of Walmart can call for an increase in the minimum wage, the Republicans should follow suit on behalf of the millions of working men and women living in poverty.'.... And yet, let us think this through. Might there be another reason Wal-Mart would advocate a higher minimum wage?... The current minimum is $5.15. According to studies, Wal-Mart pays between $8.23 and $9.68 as its national average. That means that the minimum wage could be raised 50% and still not impose higher costs on the company"

Perverted Irish priests: "Twenty-one Irish Catholic priests sexually assaulted young boys and girls in parishes across Co Wexford over a period of 40 years, a damning report into clerical abuse revealed yesterday. The Irish Government said that it would take immediate action to implement the recommendations of the report into the Diocese of Ferns, which is now regarded as the world's leading centre for clerical sexual abuse. The 271-page report catalogues 100 complaints of abuse, with one priest responsible for 26 assaults. The Ferns Report, which investigated allegations dating back to 1966, concluded that Church authorities, the medical profession and society in general failed to appreciate the horrendous damage which the sexual abuse of children causes. The report revealed that police investigations were wholly inadequate, while bishops in the Diocese of Ferns failed to take basic precautions to protect children."

The utter intellectual dishonesty and pure hatred that characterize that mini-Chomsky, Brian Leiter, has once again been exposed for what it is -- this time by Will Wilkinson

Jennifer Marohasy is blogging up a storm these days. Hers is another "Greenie Watch" blog but her focus is mainly on the nuttiness of Australian Greenies whereas I try to take a global view.

The Religious Policeman is a blog from "A Saudi man, currently living in the United Kingdom, where the Religious Police no longer trouble him for the moment". He is pretty scathing about the whole Islamic scene.

For more postings, see EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE. Mirror sites here, here, here, here and here. And on Social Security see Dick McDonald

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Practically all policies advocated by the Left create poverty. Leftists get the government to waste vast slabs of the country's labour-force on bureaucracy and paperwork and so load the burden of providing most useful goods and services onto fewer and fewer people. So fewer useful goods and services are produced to go around. That is no accident. The Left love the poor. The Left need the poor so that they can feel good by patronizing and "helping" them. So they do their best to create as many poor people as possible.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialistisch)

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