See: Why Chief Justice John Roberts spoke out
November 21, 2018
”In a statement on Wednesday, made public because of a query from The Associated Press, Roberts said, "We do not have Obama judges or Trump judges, Bush judges or Clinton judges. What we have is an extraordinary group of dedicated judges doing their level best to do equal right to those appearing before them. That independent judiciary is something we should all be thankful for."
Your above statement, Justice Roberts, made in response to President Trump’s criticism of our Judicial System handing down decisions which are “not law”, a criticism which is not only accurate, but it is documented by your very response to Trump’s criticism. Our judges and Justices job is not to do “equal right to those appearing before them” as you assert. Their job, as outlined in our very Constitution, is to support and defend “this Constitution”, and in doing so, observe “the rules of the common law”.
To put this another way, our judges and Justices are bound by our Constitution to observe and expound upon the text of our written Constitution, and its documented legislative intent, which gives context to its text. This of course is in harmony with the most fundamental rule of the “common law”. Our judges and Justices are not given latitude to do “equal right” as you assert, but are bound to adhere to the text of the Constitution and its documented legislative intent as expressed during its framing and ratification debates.
In a newspaper article published in the Alexandria Gazette, July 2, 1819, Chief Justice Marshall asserted he could "cite from [the common law] the most complete evidence that the intention is the most sacred rule of interpretation."
It should also be pointed out that the notable Justice Story, in his Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States (1833) wrote: "The first and fundamental rule in the interpretation of all instruments is, to construe them according to the sense of the terms, and the intention of the parties."
Your assertion that your job is to do “equal right to those appearing before” you, opens the door to you imposing your personal whims and fancies as being right and equal, and abandons an adherence to the “rule of law”.
To put this in other words, Justice Black once declared: “The public welfare demands that constitutional cases must be decided according to the terms of the Constitution itself, and not according to judges’ views of fairness, reasonableness, or justice.” – Justice Hugo L. Black ( U.S. Supreme Court Justice, 1886 - 1971) Source: Lecture, Columbia University, 1968
Have our judges and Justices abandoned the rule of law in favor of imposing their personal views as the rule of law? You bet they have and have even admitted it when doing so, a case in point is the Kelo ruling.
Justice Stevens in delivering the opinion of the Court writes:
while many state courts in the mid-19th century endorsed "use by the public" as the proper definition of public use, that narrow view steadily eroded over time. Not only was the "use by the public" test difficult to administer (e.g., what proportion of the public need have access to the property? at what price?),7 but it proved to be impractical given the diverse and always evolving needs of society.8 Accordingly, when this Court began applying the Fifth Amendment to the States at the close of the 19th century, it embraced the broader and more natural interpretation of public use as "public purpose.”
The irrefutable fact is, Justice Roberts, the people did not erode the meaning of “public use” via an appropriate constitutional amendment process which is the only lawful way to change the meaning of words in a Constitution. The Court took it upon itself to do for the people what they did not willingly and knowingly do for themselves with a constitutional amendment as required by our Constitution, and, the Court brazenly appealed to the “evolving needs of society” to justify its own “broader and more natural interpretation” of “public use”. And this amounts to judicial tyranny!
On the other hand, Justice Thomas, in his dissenting opinion, observes the rules of constitutional law and carefully documents the meaning of the words “public use” as they were understood during the time the constitution was adopted. He then concludes:
”The Court relies almost exclusively on this Court’s prior cases to derive today’s far-reaching, and dangerous, result. See ante, at 8-12. But the principles this Court should employ to dispose of this case are found in the Public Use Clause itself, not in Justice Peckham’s high opinion of reclamation laws, see supra, at 11. When faced with a clash of constitutional principle and a line of unreasoned cases wholly divorced from the text, history, and structure of our founding document, we should not hesitate to resolve the tension in favor of the Constitution’s original meaning. For the reasons I have given, and for the reasons given in Justice O’Connor’s dissent, the conflict of principle raised by this boundless use of the eminent domain power should be resolved in petitioners’ favor. I would reverse the judgment of the Connecticut Supreme Court.”
And then we have Helvering v. Davis” and Steward Machine Co. case upholding the Social Security Act in which the Court stated:
“Congress may spend money in aid of the ‘general welfare.’ Constitution, art. 1, 8; United States v. Butler, … There have been great statesmen in our history who have stood for other views. We will not resurrect the contest. It is now settled by decision. United States v. Butler, supra. The conception of the spending power advocated by Hamilton and strongly reinforced by Story has prevailed over that of Madison, which has not been lacking in adherents”
What is significant is, the court cited the Butler decision decided the previous year and goes on to assert Hamilton’s view concerning the phrase “general welfare” prevails over that of Madison, and it will not “resurrect the contest”. In other words, the Court refused to follow a fundamental rule of constitutional construction and review the historical record during the framing and ratification debates of our Constitution to document the meaning of “general welfare” as it was understood during the framing and ratification debates. Instead, it relied upon something Hamilton wrote years after the Constitution had been adopted concerning the phrase “general welfare” in order to uphold the socialist Social Security Act as being constitutional, and defiantly ignored the meaning of “general welfare” as expressed during the framing and ratification debates which gave birth to our Constitution. The Justice even ignored what Hamilton wrote during the framing and ratification debates:
Hamilton wrote in Federalist No. 83, which was written to explain the meaning of the Constitution, referred to a “specification of particulars” [those grants of power appearing beneath Article 1, Section, 8, Clause 1] which he goes on to say “evidently excludes all pretension to a general legislative authority“.
The bottom line is, Justice Roberts, President Trump is correct in that countless judges and Justices have, and are to this very day, ignoring the rule of law ___ the text of our Constitution and its documented legislative intent ___ and imposing what they believe is equal and right, as you did when defying the defined and limited powers granted to Congress when you pretended Congress is vested with power by our Constitution to enter the states and meddle in the people’s personal decisions and choices with regard to their health care needs ___ a power never granted to Congress!
JWK
The whole aim of construction, as applied to a provision of the Constitution, is to discover the meaning, to ascertain and give effect to the intent of its framers and the people who adopted it._____HOME BLDG. & LOAN ASS’N v. BLAISDELL, 290 U.S. 398 (1934)
