Mr. President! Free Border Patrol Agents Ramos and Compean!

Mr. President! Free Border Patrol Agents Ramos and Compean! Please join fellow GOPUSA activists in petitioning President Bush for a full pardon for Agents Jose Compean and Ignacio Ramos.

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And let's not forget the recent decisions banning the death penalty for juvenile killers which openly cited a convention of the United Nations or rulings striking down the "pledge of allegiance" because the pledge includes a reference to God.

In ruling after ruling many of these activists seem to be playing the legal version of "Quien es mas macho?" as they pursue ever more extremist policy prescriptions that would never pass in an open democratic public process. But must we sit back and accept this state of affairs?

No we shouldn't. Failing to bring errant judges to heel threatens self government itself, the very premise of our system of government. Just as the Enlightenment presaged the end of "Divine Right" monarchy, our republican form of government guarantees that the day to day decisions about our society and our lives will be subject to self-government not rule by an unelected judicial clerisy. Just because activist judges threaten self-government, it does not mean all is lost. As Ronald Reagan's Attorney General Ed Meese, once said: "The American people will never be able to regain democratic self-government--and thus shape public policy--until we curb activist judges. And curb the judges we must.

Although many of those who happen to prefer judicial dominance and its policy prescriptions to self-government argue to the contrary, Congress has many arrows in its quiver: Besides impeachment, it has broad investigative authority, through its power over the purse it sets salaries and budgets of the federal courts and has significant discretion over the jurisdiction and authority over all of the lower federal courts. In fact, it was using this latter authority last year that the House of Representatives passed two bills to limit federal court jurisdiction -- one to restrict hearing challenges to the Pledge of Allegiance, and another to restrict challenges to the Defense of Marriage Act.

Just as the founders intended, these measures were legitimate examples of the checks and balances necessary to preserve liberty that are inherent in our form of government. Rather than acting as if Mr. DeLay's comments threatened our republic, critics would well serve the public and the notion of self-government if they admitted that his comments are exactly what the framers of the Constitution would have expected.

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Horace Cooper, is a senior fellow with the Centre for New Black Leadership

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Note -- The opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions, views, and/or philosophy of GOPUSA.

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