Sponsored Content




Intermarkets' Privacy Policy
Support


Donate to Ace of Spades HQ!



Recent Entries
Absent Friends
Bandersnatch 2024
GnuBreed 2024
Captain Hate 2023
moon_over_vermont 2023
westminsterdogshow 2023
Ann Wilson(Empire1) 2022
Dave In Texas 2022
Jesse in D.C. 2022
OregonMuse 2022
redc1c4 2021
Tami 2021
Chavez the Hugo 2020
Ibguy 2020
Rickl 2019
Joffen 2014
AoSHQ Writers Group
A site for members of the Horde to post their stories seeking beta readers, editing help, brainstorming, and story ideas. Also to share links to potential publishing outlets, writing help sites, and videos posting tips to get published. Contact OrangeEnt for info:
maildrop62 at proton dot me
Cutting The Cord And Email Security
Moron Meet-Ups

NoVaMoMe 2024: 06/08/2024
Arlington, VA
Details to follow


Texas MoMe 2024: 10/18/2024-10/19/2024 Corsicana,TX
Contact Ben Had for info





















« Rush: "If Obama Fails, America Is Saved" | Main | Obama's Economic Plan explained in 4 Second Video [dri] »
March 31, 2009

Freakshow: Anti-Romney "Fanatics" Slag Ann Coulter

Worth listening to; skip the interstitial Romney-bashing stuff to get to the actual phone calls.

If Ann Coulter is insufficiently conservative, then, um... okay.

Skip to 6:00 if you don't want to listen to the whole thing. The claim that Romney himself instituted gay marriage is, as Coulter says, crazy. I have heard this claim before; it's bunk. People who aren't lawyers simply don't understand how opinions are written or what they mean. The SJC claimed that it was unconstitutional to deny marriage licenses to gay couples; the clerks who issue them therefore had to comply, or could be held in contempt (or directed to issue the license with a quickly issued writ of mandamus, an order to "do your duty"). And if they balked at that, then would come contempt, and possible jailing, or judicial elevation of another clerk to the job of issuing licenses, etc.

The idea that Romney himself wasn't directed to issue the licenses is irrelevant. Since when has the governor himself ever issued marriage license? The duty was imposed on the petty state officials who actually do such things.

This is exactly the same as claiming that when the US Supreme Court ordered the military to treat illegal combatants as protected under the Geneva Conventions, it was actually done at Bush's initiative.

It should also be noted that when the courts rewrite the law, they usually do not direct the legislature to rewrite the law as they want it to be rewritten. They just announce, "This is the new law," the legislation on the books notwithstanding. (Indeed, there are many laws remaining on the books which are no longer actually binding law due to court fiat.) True, once in a while they do in fact to direct the legislature to promulgate a new law in accordance with their sudden discovery of what the law is; but usually they just say "Here's the law."

Same thing here. The SJC did not direct the legislature to recognize gay marriage. Nor did they direct the governor to order his inferior officers to issue licenses. They don't have to. They rarely do that. They instead order the inferior officers themselves to take the action they claim is now constitutionally required.*

The difference on this issue seems to be that Ann Coulter is a lawyer and the guy making this claim is an "activist."

The only argument even makable here is that Romney could have defied the court and provoked a constitutional crisis by ordering his petty clerks not to issue such licenses, and firing the ones who did. But that is always an option left open to the executive -- and Bush didn't defy the courts, either. Who does? Like, no one since Andrew Jackson. Because the courts will ultimately prevail, most likely, and even if the executive should prevail, a constitutional crisis like this is a scary thing.

I'm not saying it shouldn't be done sometimes. One could argue here it should have been done, so lawless were the courts. But the courts are frequently lawless-- why does Mitt Romney, and Mitt Romney alone, have this special obligation to go Andrew Jackson on the courts when we make no such demands of any other governor or President?


* They probably don't do this because the legislature and executive are co-equal branches, or at least the courts sometimes pretend they are. They balk from ordering governors and legislatures -- co-equals, not inferiors -- to do this or that. But they get around this by just rewriting the law at will -- no ordering the legislature to do it; just doing it themselves -- or by ordering about lesser executive officials to do this or that.

In effect, of course, there's no difference. When they order a petty executive official to take an action, that is in fact taking the true constitutional authority from the governor to act as that man's superior and giving it to themselves. But for the sake of formalities, of pretending they're not elevating themselves above the legislature and executive, they refrain from directly ordering their coequals to do anything.

Most demands imposed will be on, say, the warden of a prison, or the Secretary of Defense, or the director of the EPA, etc. Rarely do they demand the president or governor himself undertake an action, that he himself order his subordinates to take the action.

Sometimes, yeah. But rarely.


digg this
posted by Ace at 04:12 PM

| Access Comments




Recent Comments
Alberta Oil Peon: "Well, off to the snoozer for me. Night, Horde. ..."

Alberta Oil Peon: "King Biscuit Boy with Crowbar. Had beers with Bisc ..."

Doo-Dah, Doo-Dah: "Regarding the lack of prosecution: Isn't the corr ..."

Ciampino - Update #171: "Brooklyn woman has jaw wired shut after stranger s ..."

Ciampino - Update #170: "Army suffers two Apache helicopter crashes within ..."

m: "499 ..."

m: "498 ..."

Ciampino - Update #169: "470 They say that the drummer and his Dad's reuni ..."

Ciampino - the cost of a new engine will buy a lot of fags: "459 I doubt an ordinary camera-equipped drone cou ..."

Alberta Oil Peon: "Little Feat, "Waiting For Columbus" is a darned go ..."

Stress Management Techniques for Women: "First off I want to say excellent blog! I had a qu ..."

SunyD: "The Who were never high on my playlists. None of ..."

Recent Entries
Search


Polls! Polls! Polls!
Frequently Asked Questions
The (Almost) Complete Paul Anka Integrity Kick
Top Top Tens
Greatest Hitjobs

The Ace of Spades HQ Sex-for-Money Skankathon
A D&D Guide to the Democratic Candidates
Margaret Cho: Just Not Funny
More Margaret Cho Abuse
Margaret Cho: Still Not Funny
Iraqi Prisoner Claims He Was Raped... By Woman
Wonkette Announces "Morning Zoo" Format
John Kerry's "Plan" Causes Surrender of Moqtada al-Sadr's Militia
World Muslim Leaders Apologize for Nick Berg's Beheading
Michael Moore Goes on Lunchtime Manhattan Death-Spree
Milestone: Oliver Willis Posts 400th "Fake News Article" Referencing Britney Spears
Liberal Economists Rue a "New Decade of Greed"
Artificial Insouciance: Maureen Dowd's Word Processor Revolts Against Her Numbing Imbecility
Intelligence Officials Eye Blogs for Tips
They Done Found Us Out, Cletus: Intrepid Internet Detective Figures Out Our Master Plan
Shock: Josh Marshall Almost Mentions Sarin Discovery in Iraq
Leather-Clad Biker Freaks Terrorize Australian Town
When Clinton Was President, Torture Was Cool
What Wonkette Means When She Explains What Tina Brown Means
Wonkette's Stand-Up Act
Wankette HQ Gay-Rumors Du Jour
Here's What's Bugging Me: Goose and Slider
My Own Micah Wright Style Confession of Dishonesty
Outraged "Conservatives" React to the FMA
An On-Line Impression of Dennis Miller Having Sex with a Kodiak Bear
The Story the Rightwing Media Refuses to Report!
Our Lunch with David "Glengarry Glen Ross" Mamet
The House of Love: Paul Krugman
A Michael Moore Mystery (TM)
The Dowd-O-Matic!
Liberal Consistency and Other Myths
Kepler's Laws of Liberal Media Bias
John Kerry-- The Splunge! Candidate
"Divisive" Politics & "Attacks on Patriotism" (very long)
The Donkey ("The Raven" parody)
Powered by
Movable Type 2.64