The recent Supreme Court ruling on California's Prop 8 (that amended the state constitution to declare that marriage was between 1 man and 1 woman) has just emasculated the initiative process. The initiative process is a way for the People to directly legislate. This is often at odds with what the elected legislators want. Certainly, the majority Democrat legislature of California didn't want Prop 8 to pass. The current governor doesn't want to enforce it. But the people, by a statewide vote, wanted it. Democracy, don't you know. But, as one would expect, those who lost the vote went to court. And won. This in and of itself is a problem. Do the people have the right to rule themselves or not? But that's another issue. What happened after that first court case is at issue. The state government refused to defend the constitution of the state before the Supreme Court. Yes, it is a duly passed amendment and the state government is, in theory, required to adhere to it but refused to defend it in court. Well, it's a court case and someone must speak up. Someone did. And the court ruled that they didn't have standing to defend Prop 8. Therefore, the lower court ruling stands.
What does this mean in the long run? What if the People of California pass an initiative to limit the terms of government service? A few 'public servants' sue and the state refuses to defend the proposition. Voila! It is overturned. The vote of the People can be dismissed and the People don't have standing to appeal. This is going to be a lesson learned by those who oppose the initiative process. Do a bit of judge shopping to get the right ruling and then count on the government - that is never thrilled by uppity citizens trying to limit its power - to not defend citizen initiatives.
Oh, but these legislators will be voted out, right? Unlikely. The legislators will blame the governor, the governor will blame the judge, and the judge is untouchable. The People are no longer citizens, they are subjects. Government is too big to control and it is now on a permanent spiral to more and more power. This is just the latest sign that the People have far less say than they think.
5 comments:
You can use your same arguement .re;
the voting rights act was passed in 2006 by 98 senator and 390 house members and made it in effect for the next 25 yrs. There were many discussions and thousands of pages written and the Republicans didnt like it so they went to the courts and the Supreme Court gutted it. Both Republicans and Dems go to the courts to get their way.
The Supreme Court only overturned the part of the Voting Rights Act that used 40 year old data to determine which localities would suffer unequal treatment under the law. Really, it Todd County, South Dakota a hotbed of racism that must forever bend a knee to the feeds while neighboring counties are left alone? Is 48 years not long enough to reform these places? Virginia, covered by the VRA, had a black governor but is still considered suspect for racism? Really? In any case, Congress is entirely within its rights to update the law to reflect 2013 rather than 1965 and reinstitute that portion of the law. Obviously, the law had near unanimous support so an update shouldn't be an issue, right?
As for Prop 8, the citizenry could pass a new prop but the state government can simply refuse to defend it in court. There is no means of redress. The initiative process has been killed.
Note that the Constitution says that We The People are the sovereign. The Supreme Court just declared that We The People lack standing to defend a constitutional amendment that We The People enacted.
40 year old data did not have to be used because there were many examples that the court could have used that have occurred in the last 5 yrs,(think TX, Ala., Miss. No. Carolina, etc.) but Scalia had already believed that voting is a racial preference ( for whites it is a right guarenteed by the constitution, for blacks it is a racial preference and needed to be curtailed, gutted. Coverage should have been expanded.
Any county or State can be removed from the demands of the Voting Rights Act if they have shown that the state or county did not pass any voter or other discriminatory bills. There have been several counties that have done this and they are no longer under the act.
When the Voting Rights Act was renewed we had a White Republican President and now we have a black president. There will be few Rep. who will pass another bill and it would be filibustered in the Senate. As Mitch McConnell said we will not give Obama a single victory and renewing or expanding would look like a victory and they will not allow that.
Do you believe that because we have a black president or a black governor racism is dead? Oh please, racism is alive and well.
A law that was passed in Indiana requiring voter ID was perfectly fine and not subject to the Voting Rights Act. The same law passed in states covered by VRA was blocked by the Justice Department. Either the law is racist or it isn't. You can't have it perfectly fine in one jurisdiction and racist in another. The same rules need to apply to everyone. If not, you need to provide some evidence that a different set of laws need to apply to certain states.
What are these examples in the last 5 years? Could you supply the quote from Scalia that white votes are guaranteed while black votes must be curtailed?
Please read Justice Ginsberg's response. I dont know how to cut and paste and I couldnt get it to email.
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