Category Archives: Constitution

Just Another Injustice

Constitution, Crime, Criminal Injustice, Justice, Law

* “Wikileaks founder Julian Assange said in an interview published on Sunday that he believes the Pentagon could be behind a rape accusation against him that was later dropped by Swedish prosecutors.”

Exactly my thoughts.

* CONRAD BLACK. “The U.S. Supreme Court had asked the appellate panel in Chicago to reconsider the 2007 jury finding [against Conrad Black] in light of the high court’s June decision to limit the federal ‘honest services’ fraud statute to instances of bribery and kickbacks not present in the Black case,” reports Bloomberg.com.

Better late than never.

From “Crucifying Conrad (Black)”: “The SEC operates on an unconstitutional ex post facto basis; its victims have no way of foreseeing or controlling how vague law will be bent and charges changed in the course of seeking the desired prosecutorial outcome.

Propelling the SEC are politically voracious prosecutors. Aided by George Bush’s latest legislative abomination—the Sarbanes-Oxley Act—they can pursue any business executive as long as a lay jury can be convinced the unfortunate chap intended to mislead or stiff shareholders. This is as easy as pie, given the common man’s affinity for wealth creators. As America’s regulators run out of entrepreneurs to eliminate, so they seek fodder from among foreign investors, hence Black.”

* Justice Department Überbloodhound Patrick Fitzgerald is the worm who used the full power of the state to pursue Black, and now Blago, Gov. Milorad Blagojevich (Fitzgerald has many more scalps under his judicial belt, involving abuse of power, such as the Lewis Libby prosecution). The latter may not be a pleasant person, but I doubt he has done anything that is naturally elicit: “The prosecution has failed to show that the Blagojeviches did anything more than shoot the breeze.”

UPDATED: ‘Justice Brennan’s Footnote Gave Us Anchor Babies’

Ann Coulter, Constitution, IMMIGRATION, Welfare

ANN COULTER is ever the ace on matters of law: “Democrats act as if the right to run across the border when you’re eight and a half months pregnant, give birth in a U.S. hospital and then immediately start collecting welfare was exactly what our forebears had in mind, a sacred constitutional right, as old as the 14th Amendment itself.

The louder liberals talk about some ancient constitutional right, the surer you should be that it was invented in the last few decades.

In fact, this alleged right derives only from a footnote slyly slipped into a Supreme Court opinion by Justice Brennan in 1982. You might say it sneaked in when no one was looking, and now we have to let it stay.

The 14th Amendment was added after the Civil War to overrule the Supreme Court’s Dred Scott decision, which had held that black slaves were not citizens of the United States. …

The drafters of the 14th Amendment had no intention of conferring citizenship on the children of aliens who happened to be born in the U.S. (For my younger readers, back in those days, people cleaned their own houses and raised their own kids.) …

… And then, out of the blue in 1982, Justice Brennan slipped a footnote into his 5-4 opinion in Plyler v. Doe, asserting that “no plausible distinction with respect to 14th Amendment ‘jurisdiction’ can be drawn between resident aliens whose entry into the United States was lawful, and resident aliens whose entry was unlawful.” (Other than the part about one being lawful and the other not.)”

A must read by ANN COULTER. …

UPDATE (Aug. 6): In reply to “Patriot”:

Here on BAB we are a little more circumspect about chief cheerleader for Bush during his reign of terror, who piped up mostly about, safe, small issues, and is a reliable Republican water carrier. We recommend you read through the Coulter Archive on BAB, and the same archive in the Articles Archive for a realistic reappraisal.

UPDATED: 'Justice Brennan's Footnote Gave Us Anchor Babies'

Ann Coulter, Constitution, IMMIGRATION, Welfare

ANN COULTER is ever the ace on matters of law: “Democrats act as if the right to run across the border when you’re eight and a half months pregnant, give birth in a U.S. hospital and then immediately start collecting welfare was exactly what our forebears had in mind, a sacred constitutional right, as old as the 14th Amendment itself.

The louder liberals talk about some ancient constitutional right, the surer you should be that it was invented in the last few decades.

In fact, this alleged right derives only from a footnote slyly slipped into a Supreme Court opinion by Justice Brennan in 1982. You might say it sneaked in when no one was looking, and now we have to let it stay.

The 14th Amendment was added after the Civil War to overrule the Supreme Court’s Dred Scott decision, which had held that black slaves were not citizens of the United States. …

The drafters of the 14th Amendment had no intention of conferring citizenship on the children of aliens who happened to be born in the U.S. (For my younger readers, back in those days, people cleaned their own houses and raised their own kids.) …

… And then, out of the blue in 1982, Justice Brennan slipped a footnote into his 5-4 opinion in Plyler v. Doe, asserting that “no plausible distinction with respect to 14th Amendment ‘jurisdiction’ can be drawn between resident aliens whose entry into the United States was lawful, and resident aliens whose entry was unlawful.” (Other than the part about one being lawful and the other not.)”

A must read by ANN COULTER. …

UPDATE (Aug. 6): In reply to “Patriot”:

Here on BAB we are a little more circumspect about chief cheerleader for Bush during his reign of terror, who piped up mostly about, safe, small issues, and is a reliable Republican water carrier. We recommend you read through the Coulter Archive on BAB, and the same archive in the Articles Archive for a realistic reappraisal.

What’s Fueling The Fever Of Freedom?

Constitution, IMMIGRATION, libertarianism, Liberty, Political Philosophy, Private Property, States' Rights

IMMIGRATION IS. When states stand up to the always-oppressive federal government, it’s a good thing. When issues loom large enough to bring about this necessary rift—necessary if freedom is to prevail—they deserve a closer look, if not, I would argue, our unreserved support. If gay marriage, yea or nay, prompted a state to secede; I’d be the first to cheer that state on.

Virginia’s Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli has ruled that “state law enforcement officers are allowed to check the immigration status of anyone ‘stopped or arrested.” According to FoxNews, Cuccinelli issued a legal opinion on Friday “extending that authority to Virginia police in response to an inquiry over whether his state could mirror the policies passed into law in Arizona.”

“It is my opinion that Virginia law enforcement officers, including conservation officers may, like Arizona police officers, inquire into the immigration status of persons stopped or arrested,” he wrote.

Bring it on is what Cuccinelli is telling the federal government.

According to Lou Dobbs, interviewed by Megyn Kelly, “11 states are preparing to emulate Arizona. It is not what the Obama administration wanted; but it is exactly what the American people want,” he told the host of America’s News. Kelly says there are at least 18 states poised to follow Arizona on immigration and into a conflagration with the feds.

Now, you could challenge me as follows: “Mercer, you are not a proponent of majoritarianism. You’ve argued vigorously against democracy—even have a book due out that is a manifesto against raw democracy. Why are the people’s wishes okay in this instance?”

Because, as I’ve often said (most recently in this blog post), people have negative, leave-me-alone rights. Preventing a foreign invasion is perfectly within the purview of the “night-watchman state of classical-liberal theory,” in the words of the late philosopher, Robert Nozick.

Having delegated defense and policing to government, a people has a right to live free of the dangers that flow from being trespassed upon.

To the American Founding Fathers, Thomas Jefferson especially, secession was essential to the American scheme. Jefferson viewed extreme decentralization as the bulwark of the liberty and rights of man. Consequently, the United States was created as a pact between sovereign states with which the ultimate power lay. Sadly, it has progressed from a decentralized republic into a highly consolidated one.

The Constitution assigns the narrow function of naturalization to the feds. That small thing notwithstanding; I find it hard to fathom a founder arguing that the men and militia of a state should sit on their hands because a tier of tyrants (the feds) told them to (while their farms and nature reserves are trashed and their families endangered).

Neither should libertarians sit this thing out.