History And The Judiciary
By Paul M. Weyrich
July 11, 2008
Page 3 of 5
- an unbroken series of Senate confirmations of originalist judges;
- unwavering constitutionalism by originalist judges in their years on the bench, withstanding daily assault by infuriated cultural "elites" who grew accustomed to using legally void and impotent court opinions as bulldozers to deceive and enslave Americans via a-moral, anti-constitutional and increasingly tyrannical judicial delusions.
Not a single signer of the Constitution (or of the Declaration of Independence) would have taken seriously the purportedly "conservative" view today that to restrain judges we need to replace them through attrition over decades. That view, in my opinion, guarantees a victory of the far left because it implies that the judicial branch is the final authority on the law.
In his book and British Broadcasting Corporation series Civilization, historian Sir Kenneth Clarke noted that after the dissolution of the Roman Empire, scattered pockets of normalcy continued for a surprisingly long time. How will we know, living in such "pockets of normalcy," when our republic has collapsed? Has it already? Are we prisoners who still think themselves free?
For the sake of this republic I urge my friends, fellow leaders and Americans emphatically to repudiate the devastating myth that judges have the power to make and redefine our laws. We should do so rapidly and forcefully before our republic is replaced by the irresistible tyranny of men and women who believe that nihilist elites should make the rules and pass them to judges for formal announcement when the time is ripe for the latest step into the post-rule of law, post-moral abyss. Otherwise our "conservatism" will continue to be merely the rearguard for subtle left-wing revolution.
The tragedy of how we have reached this point: in our desire for social acceptance and respectability among the anti-constitutional, anti-rule of law, anti-Christian, anti-family nihilist left, "conservative" elites have abandoned the core principles of our Constitution. We have flouted the warnings of the likes of Thomas Jefferson, who wrote:
To consider the judges as the ultimate arbiters of all constitutional questions [is] a very dangerous doctrine indeed, and one which would place us under the despotism of an oligarchy. ...The Constitution has erected no such single tribunal, knowing that to whatever hands confided, with the corruptions of time and party, its members would become despots.
Alexander Hamilton was perhaps the strongest advocate of "judicial review" -- the right of judges to opine on our Constitution. But an opinion on the meaning of the Constitution is merely an advisory opinion to the legislative and executive branches of government. Not even Hamilton imagined that the right to opine is a power to rule. Courts, he pointed out, intentionally have been given no means of enforcing their opinions, noting that the executive and legislative branches are not compelled to obey false or dubious opinions. Therefore, he wrote:
...The judiciary, from the nature of its functions, will always be the least dangerous to the political rights of the Constitution. ... [T]he judiciary...has no influence over either the sword or purse; no direction either of the strength or of the wealth of the society; and can take no active resolution whatever. It may truly be said to have neither force nor will....
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