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Polonius wrote:I'm guessing he's referring more to the idea of a living constitution, in which the same text is interpreted more in the "spirit of the times", compared to originalism which seeks to interpret the constitution according to the original intent of the framers (as seen in letters, diaries, debates etc. of the time.)

But... these are the same thing. The framers intended for the legislation to be interpreted according to the mores of the day. I don't get the objection.

WARBOSS TZOO wrote:

Polonius wrote:I'm guessing he's referring more to the idea of a living constitution, in which the same text is interpreted more in the "spirit of the times", compared to originalism which seeks to interpret the constitution according to the original intent of the framers (as seen in letters, diaries, debates etc. of the time.)

But... these are the same thing. The framers intended for the legislation to be interpreted according to the mores of the day. I don't get the objection.

The constitution isn't legislation. Legislation generally refers to acts, statutes, etc. passed by a legislative body and signed into law by the executive. The Constitution is a higher form of law that is far more difficult to adopt or amend.

As for the framers, well, they weren't looking 200 years into the future. They were clear in that they wanted the constitution to be the foundation of government, similar to the way that sovereigns are in monarchies. And there are many ways in which Con Law has changed due to shifting cultural mores, most notably in the areas of free speech. 100 years ago, people were sent to jail for advocating to young men not to register for the draft. Now that would be impossible.

Other areas of law have developed, for example, the law of search and seizure in automobiles. You're protected against searches of your person, home, or papers, but what about a car? What about an RV?

Other areas are trickier. There is no explicit right to privacy, yet the courts have pretty consistently found one. Substantive Due Process, which essentially is the right to control your own life and family, is virtually composed of whole cloth. It's good, in that it prevents states from banning things like birth control, or banning home schooling, but those rights aren't in there.

The Supreme court's job isn't to re-write the constitution. It can stretch it, or alter it a bit to fit better, but the living constitution idea allows social mores to essentially become a new tyranny of the majority, which is the main thing that the constitution tried to prevent.

Polonius wrote:The constitution isn't legislation.

My bad, I just today had my final exam for Intro to Australian Law. Kind of have that word on the brain.


And "mores" was a bad word choice. It is reasonably clear in their writings that they didn't want the constitution to be a static document, they did in fact want it to be interpreted, to be a 'living document'. To appeal to how the law was seen by the founders and to want to go back to that just seems to me to be incredibly silly given this.

And you're right, the Supreme Court's job isn't to rewrite the constitution. However, this is the same as with all courts; they don't rewrite laws, they interpret them. Seeing the constitution as a living document means that the Supreme Court has the ability to do exactly that, not create judge made law out of thin air.

I've never seen any evidence that the framers wanted the constitution to be seen as a living document. They wanted it to be amended, to be sure, and they knew some change was inevitable.

The court also interprets laws in the context of it's own precedent. The common law is important, even in constitutional law.

If the constitution was not ever to be changed it would not contain the instrument by which it can be changed by the process of amendment.

It is worth nothing it is rather difficult to change the constitution. Only 33 amendments have ever made it through the process and six of them are either dead (timed out) or still pending ratification and will probably never be ratified.

Since the process of making amendments relies on a lengthy process of democratic consultation, ultimately they are introduced by a kind of tyranny of the majority.

Since they are done by the people of the day, naturally they will reflect the spirit of the times -- women's suffrage is a good example.

IGLannister wrote:I am all for immigration laws. I think illegal immigration is a very large issue. So why are we not fining all the corporations and businesses that utilize illegal labor? You don't care about that. You're totally ok with this country morphing into a police state, aren't you?

Oddly, Arizona has a law for that, passed back when Napolitano was in charge of AZ. Now President Obama has asked the Supreme Court to kill it.................

I'm still trying to figure out what part of ILLEGAL immigrant those opposed to this don't understand........?

I don't think people are ignoring the illegal part, I think there are a lot of people that have trouble vilifying those that come to America for opportunity the only way they can thanks to the current laws.

I don't support it or condone it, but I'd probably do the same thing in their shoes.

I think most people opposed know that the establishment tacitly supports illegal immigrants due to the labor savings to farms and small business. They're the silent villains, not the guys working for $25 a day.

This law isn't going to do anything. You mean to tell me that when you arrest somebody, you haven't been running a quick check to see if they're legally here? Really?

I think people see this bill as just being full of hatred towards the illegals, to an extent that a lot of people find unsettling.

don_mondo wrote:

IGLannister wrote:I am all for immigration laws. I think illegal immigration is a very large issue. So why are we not fining all the corporations and businesses that utilize illegal labor? You don't care about that. You're totally ok with this country morphing into a police state, aren't you?

Oddly, Arizona has a law for that, passed back when Napolitano was in charge of AZ. Now President Obama has asked the Supreme Court to kill it.................

I'm still trying to figure out what part of ILLEGAL immigrant those opposed to this don't understand........?

That it's alternatively redundant, bizarrely ill-thought out, and very likely to be struck down as unconstitutional? That it was basically passed to appease their voters rather than because it's a good idea? That it's a single state trying to dictate how scarce federal resources are spent? That it will inflame racial tensions and make immigrants less likely to report crimes so as to stay off the radar of the police? That the law doesn't give discretion to local authorities to apply their resources where they will be best used?

Yeah, there are no reasonable objections to SB1070.

don_mondo wrote:I'm still trying to figure out what part of ILLEGAL immigrant those opposed to this don't understand........?

The part of "Illegal" that makes them ineligible to vote. This is simple pandering by the Left to a potentially HUGE voting block that will ensure their places of power for years to come if they can move them into the ranks of eligible voters.

That's the real reason Lefties want immigration "reform"(read:amnesty)... they can sweep a huge demographic into being that will vote for them.

Of course, with most illegal immigrants hispanic, and generally socially conservative, the bump won't be so huge.

Saying that political gain is the real reason liberals want immigration reform is about as true as saying that xenophobia is the real reason right wingers don't. There's an unsettling grain of truth to both, but there are also really good reasons on both sides.

Maybe we want them to pay taxes like the rest of us, maybe we want tom to have to be paid min wage so there would be no point in not hiring Americans.

The Green Git wrote:

don_mondo wrote:I'm still trying to figure out what part of ILLEGAL immigrant those opposed to this don't understand........?

The part of "Illegal" that makes them ineligible to vote. This is simple pandering by the Left to a potentially HUGE voting block that will ensure their places of power for years to come if they can move them into the ranks of eligible voters.

That's the real reason Lefties want immigration "reform"(read:amnesty)... they can sweep a huge demographic into being that will vote for them.

It worked for the Labour Party in the UK. It can get the Democrats into government too!

sexiest_hero wrote:Maybe we want them to pay taxes like the rest of us

Congrats, you already have that.

edit: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=881584

Something missing from this discussion is: States don't have the authority to deport illegals, until now. The illegals were sent to the ICE agency and deported there, now a step is removed.

As for the "papers" argument, a cop can't arbitrarily ask for your ID without facing legal ramifications, regardless of race. 4th Amendment right there. They ask for a drivers license when you speed, why wouldn't having a green card be the same thing? Having nothing on you is a problem, whether you are a citizen or not.

Intellectual honesty is a big part of this that is missing.

The rule of law is more important than some "flavor of the month" debate. This is why changing the Constitution is so hard, not because the founders liked slavery or limited suffrage, it was to prevent sweeping changes from happening over a short period of time. That is anarchy.

IG_Lannister, it's been quite some time since I have seen this many talking points. [url]

Stormrider wrote:Something missing from this discussion is: States don't have the authority to deport illegals, until now. The illegals were sent to the ICE agency and deported there, now a step is removed.

States still don't have the authority to deport anybody. SB1070 doesn't do anything more than require police to enforce federal law. All people arrested in this manner are still sent to ICE for processing.

As for the "papers" argument, a cop can't arbitrarily ask for your ID without facing legal ramifications, regardless of race. [url]

Completely untrue. Anytime an officer initiates contqact with any person for any reason whatsoever, they ask for ID. Sure, you can deny them your information, but all this will accomplish is a (not so)quick trip to the station for fingerprinting.

Phryxis wrote:
It'd be one thing if every Ebonics speaker used the same patterns and variations from "standard" English, but, in reality it's more a catchall term applied to anything that black folks say that isn't standard. It's just more of an "excuse" than an actual dialect.

Dialects don't have standardized forms, and are generally defined as the nonstandard speech of a given group of people. A good example is the distinction between American English and Anglo-English.