Oct. 13, 2020
Permission to republish original opeds and cartoons granted.
Why won’t Joe just say ‘no’ to court packing
As Joe Biden continues to duck, dodge, and weave on the question of packing the Supreme Court, an elected official in his own party is calling court packing “a dangerous proposal.”
Cartoon: If flies were lies
It’s the lies, not the flies we should be worried about.
ALG in the News: Reactionary Times
ALG president Rick Manning talked to Bill Martinez on his nationally syndicated radio show that justice should be “swift” and he’s “disappointed that after a year-and-a-half there is little to show.”
ALG in the News: Fits News Thank You, Sen. Lindsey Graham, for standing up for the Constitution
ALG President Rick Manning praises Senator Lindsey Graham in an oped in Fits News for his work steering the nomination of Judge Barrett to the floor of the Senate. Many politicians in Washington, D.C. would shrink in the glare of an unending political attack – yet Graham has been steadfast and resolute in his determination to provide Judge Barrett a fair hearing.
Video: If Biden wins, he'll shut down America, pack the Supreme Court and implement the Green New Deal
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Why won’t Joe just say ‘no’ to court packing
By Catherine Mortensen
As Joe Biden continues to duck, dodge, and weave on the question of packing the Supreme Court, an elected official in his own party is calling court packing a “dangerous proposal.” Biden said the American people will have to wait until after the election to know what he thinks of court packing. He’s already getting pushback from within his own party. Democratic Congressman Collin Peterson (D-Minn.) has introduced a bi-partisan resolution to permanently set the number of U.S. Supreme Court Justices at nine. Peterson’s resolution is the first step toward protecting the highest court in the land from political corruption that Biden’s far-left base is calling for.
The resolution to amend the Constitution simply states: “The Supreme Court of the United States shall be composed of nine justices.”
“The Supreme Court is an important part of our country’s system of checks and balances, and it is vital that we preserve its independence,” said Peterson. “I worry that partisan attempts to change the size of the court will set off a judicial arms race which will further divide our country. If one party succeeds in packing the court, the next party to hold a majority may choose to do the same in retaliation. My amendment will preserve the integrity of the court and permanently protect Americans from these dangerous proposals.”
Congressman Denver Riggleman (R-Va.) co-sponsored the resolution, noting that “the independence and non-partisan nature of the Supreme Court of the United States is a core aspect of American government.”
Currently, the number of supreme court justices is set by congress through statute. Lawmakers have changed the number of justices several times throughout the nation’s history, and last modified the size of the court in 1869 when congress raised the number of justices from seven to nine.
“Packing the court” was coined by president franklin D. Roosevelt, and was a slang term for the judicial procedures reform bill of 1937.
Roosevelt sought to reform the number of Supreme Court Justices in an effort to obtain a favorable ruling for the New Deal legislation. The central provision of the bill would have granted the president power to appoint an additional justice to the supreme court — up to a maximum of six — for every member of the court over the age of 70 years and six months.
Roosevelt’s bill went nowhere. The public and Congress rejected it, seeing it for what it was, a power grab. No president has ever tried it since. Or even threatened it. Until now.
According to Carrie Severino, president of the Judicial Crisis Network, Biden wants to “replace our current Supreme Court with a liberal super-legislature, stacked with politicians-turned-judges in the mold of AOC, Nancy Pelosi, Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren. All with lifetime appointments, rewriting the law and Constitution.”
Roman Buehler, director of Keep Nine, a coalition of legal scholars dedicated to protecting the Supreme Court from politicization says Biden’s failure to reject court packing is troublesome.
“It’s clear that court packing is a direct assault on the constitutional checks and balances that this county has depended on for more than 150 year,” he said. Buehler explained that for the first 80 years of the court’s history, there was “political manipulation of the court by both parties.” After the Civil War, he said a tradition grew up that the court ought to be independent and serve as a “critical check on the abuse of federal power.
“Today some very short-sided people are trying to do what Roosevelt tried and failed to do. If they succeed in packing the court, they will undermine the independence of the court by the rule of law.”
Curiously, and contrary to the facts, Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.)is claiming that confirming Judge Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court “constitutes court-packing.”
President Trump exercising his power to fill the Ginsburg vacancy on the Supreme Court with Judge Barrett is not court-packing, it is fulfilling constitutional duty. Under Article II, Section 2, the president is to “nominate, and by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, shall appoint … judges of the Supreme Court…” Court-packing, as every American history student in high school should learn, is an illegitimate attempt to increase the number of Supreme Court justices in order to have those justices rule in favor of unconstitutional laws, regulations and actions.
“Republicans won the Senate election in 2014, and the White House in 2016, and elections have consequences,” said Rick Manning, president of Americans for Limited Government. ”Presidents don’t serve for three years. They serve for four years. In 2016, when the Scalia seat became vacant, former President Barack Obama wasted no time in exercising his constitutional authority to attempt to fill it with Merrick Garland even though it was his last year in office, just as the Republican Senate exercised its right to just say no. Now the Senate is considering the Barrett nomination, as is their prerogative under the Constitution. It cannot be emphasized enough that filling a vacancy is legitimate, while creating vacancies for political purposes would do violence to the independence of federal courts.”
Biden won’t just say “no” to court packing because he fears it will alienate his far-left base. But his dance around the issue has already alienated at least one Democratic Member of Congress. We’ll have to “wait until after the election” to find out how many independent voters he’s alienated.
Catherine Mortensen is vice president of communications for Americans for Limited Government.
To view higher resolution image, click here.
ALG in the News: Reactionary Times
ALG president Rick Manning talked to Bill Martinez on his nationally syndicated radio show that justice should be “swift” and he’s “disappointed that after a year-and-a-half there is little to show.”
To view clip, click here.
Thank You, Sen. Lindsey Graham, for standing up for the Constitution
By Rick Manning
Thank you, Senator Lindsey Graham, for standing up for the Constitution as the Senate considers whether to confirm the nomination of Judge Amy Coney Barrett to the United States Supreme Court.
In times like these, America needs a strong Judiciary Committee Chairman who won’t be bullied by screaming anarchists in the street. America needs a leader who will not be intimidated by a nationwide effort to unseat him simply because he stood up for truth during the confirmation hearing of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. We need a leader who is not afraid to stand up for the independence of the Judicial branch against those who would pack the Supreme Court in order to allow a Marxist agenda to move ahead unimpeded.
As many South Carolinians know, the organization of which I am president – Americans for Limited Government – has not always been one of Senator Graham’s biggest fans. And it is for this reason, that I am writing this article.
Senator Lindsey Graham is earning your vote this week as he steers the nomination of Judge Barrett to the floor of the Senate. Many politicians in Washington, D.C. would shrink in the glare of an unending political attack – yet Graham has been steadfast and resolute in his determination to provide Judge Barrett a fair hearing.
As the Chairman himself said at the beginning of the hearing: “One of the most important jobs the Senate Judiciary Committee will ever do is have hearings and confirm a Justice to the Supreme Court.”
Refusing to back down to the demands of desperate mob seeking to stop the nomination, Graham spoke about Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s confirmation, a nominee who had unmistakable far left views when he reminded America: “There was a time in this country where someone like Ruth Bader Ginsburg was seen by almost everybody as qualified for the position of being on the Supreme Court, understanding that she would have a different philosophy than many of the Republicans who voted for her.”
Judge Amy Coney Barrett is similarly well qualified for a seat on the Supreme Court of the United States, as her legal acumen is unquestioned on both sides of the aisle.
However, in the past California Senators Dianne Feinstein and Kamala Harris have used religious bigotry to attack Trump nominees, including Judge Barrett in 2017.
Feinstein famously attacked Barrett for her faith saying, “the dogma lives loudly within you, and that’s a concern.”
Harris went so far in 2018 to attack a federal circuit court judicial nominee due to his membership in the Knights of Columbus due to their pro-life organizational stance.
And another nominee, Russ Vought, was chastised and voted against by Senator Bernie Sanders (Socialist-VT) because of his personal Christian faith, decrying the idea that belief in Jesus Christ is the only way to heaven in spite of this tenet being directly from Jesus’ own words as recorded in the Gospel of John 14:6 where He said, “I am the way, the truth and the life, no one comes to the Father but through the Son.”
Chairman Graham has laid down the law against this kind of anti-Christian religious bigotry being a part of this Judiciary Committee hearing.
America is a nation of laws. A nine-member Supreme Court has never been more important than it is today, and South Carolina should be proud that it’s senior senator, Lindsey Graham is courageously leading the way forward in leading the Judiciary Committee to hear and hopefully move the nomination forward for full Senate consideration.
Amy Coney Barrett is one of the most qualified legal scholars to be put forward by a President in history, and she will be a great Supreme Court Justice.
If Barrett is confirmed for a seat on the court, America will owe a debt of gratitude to Senator Lindsey Graham. He has steadfastly ignored the tens of millions of dollars in political attack ads waged against him paid for by out of state donors in order to do right by the people of South Carolina and the United States of America.
For standing up for the Constitution against enormous pressure, South Carolina owes Senator Graham one big thank you. Click here if you would like to thank Senator Graham for standing up when others would have cowered.
Rick Manning is the President of Americans for Limited Government.
To view online: https://www.fitsnews.com/2020/10/12/guest-column-thank-you-senator-lindsey-graham/
