Congress Seeks Authority to Overturn Supreme Court Decisions

[Woodmonkey]

By Jimmy Moore
Talon News
April 16, 2004

WASHINGTON (Talon News) -- Rep. Ron Lewis (R-KY) has offered legislation in the U.S. House of Representatives that would allow Congress to overturn future U.S. Supreme Court decisions by a super majority vote.

"The Congressional Accountability for Judicial Activism Act," or H.R. 3920, would give Congress permission to override certain U.S. Supreme Court rulings if two-thirds of both houses of Congress vote for it.

Lewis said he drafted this legislation to combat the activist judges who have been "legislating from the bench" in recent years.

"America's judicial branch has become increasingly overreaching and disconnected from the values of everyday Americans," Lewis observed in a statement.

Lewis states the judiciary has ceased interpreting the law and is now making law ...

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http://www.talonnews.com/

[AndJusticeForAll]

I like the separation of powers just the way it is, thank you very much.

[Woodmonkey]

Originally Posted by AndJusticeForAll

I like the separation of powers just the way it is, thank you very much.

Same here. Congress can still go in and word a law in such a way as to get around a ruling if enough elected officials are for it.

Just think what Congress might have done with these powers during the 60's and the Civil Rights Movement?

[Carnage_59]

Remember forced bussing in Boston and other cities in the 1970s?? No law was passed, just a judge saying it had to be done. Since when do judges legislate?? They shouldn't but they do. What did forced bussing accomplish?? It wasted a bunch of money.

When Thomas Jefferson was president, the Supreme Court decided something that was in the form of legislation and ordered the Executive Branch (i.e., the President) to do it. He was asked about it by a Congressman to which Mr. Jefferson replied, "If the Supreme Court has the means to enforce it, let them do it. I won't."

Many people in this country think once a court has spoken that's it. Not true. The judges' duties is to interpret the law, but since the 1960s we've had a LOT of activists on the bench legislating from the bench things that elected officials weren't going to do.

Folks, I was stunned about two years ago to hear an African-American man call into one of the radio stations in Washington DC and ask the announcer, "Why doesn't some judge write a law giving me more money so I can rent a better house?" The announcer told him that judges aren't supposed to legislate. The man replied, "A judge made a law for me to go to a different school in Detroit. Why isn't this any different?"

President Bill Clinton legislated by Executive Order. He signed over 4,000 of them. Only ONE was overturned in court. One of his aides, Paul Begala said, "Stroke of the pen, law of the land. Isn't it great?"

Up till Clinton was elected, there were less than 100 Executive Orders written from FDR all the way to Bush I.

What does that tell you???