Judicial Activism

Judicial activism is a term that has had a lot of use over the past several years. It is a sound bite used as a effort to convince voters to vote a certain way. Sound bites have become a common method of trying to influence opinions. In many cases those sound bites have been very effective, even when they are giving an erroneous view of what policies actually are being advocated.

Exactly who or what constitutes judicial activism, and who decides. The answer to that question depends a lot on which side of a particular issue you are standing on. The inference we hear most in regard to this term is that the activist judges are those that have a liberal leaning. It is inferred that they are trying to change the constitution. Those making the accusations like to refer to themselves as 'originalists'.

The term originalist is a calculated attempt to convince everyone that they are interpreting the constitution in the same way as those who wrote the document. They want us to believe that they are neither adding anything to or taking anything away from this basic document of our republic. However, when you look at their opinions it seems somewhat out of line with the freedoms and rights that our founding fathers promoted for our new country. Those founders of our country left room knowing that times would change, opinions would change, and events would change. They wanted a document that gave some leeway while still protecting our most basic rights and the tenets we hold dear.

This country was established with the power of governing to be shared between three branches of government. The executive branch was the President and Vice-President, the legislative consists of the senate and house of representatives, and the judicial of the various federal courts ending with the Supreme Court.

The duties of each branch can be basically explained as follows: the Executive carries out federal laws, recommends new ones, directs the national defense and foreign policy, commands government, and does ceremonial functions. The Legislative is charged with passing new laws, originating spending The judicial branch was charged with intepreting the laws and insuring that they adhere to our constitution.

There are ample instances of each branch overstepping the bounds of their constitutionally prescribed duties. The Executive has often stated their own interpretation of the constitution in regard to laws passed. Sometimes this has been upheld by the courts and other times it has been overturned. The legislative has attempted to go around the judicial by prescribing not only the laws, but the mandatory punishment - without regard to all circumstances. And the judicial has at times been too strict or too lenient in their sentencing. And all have at one time or another crossed the other two branches.

The fact is that we have an imperfect form of government. It is only better than everything else out there. We, as citizens, are charged to protect this government. We must keep it in check and make sure that it responds to the needs of it's people and that it follows our constitution. We must not give up our hard fought freedoms, and we must not let those freedoms lead us to become a country of scoundrels and scalawags.

We have a system to protect our courts. The judges are appointed and the district judges and above must be confirmed by the senate. They can also be impeached if found guilty of wrongdoing. We need to remove judges that are incompetent. However, we must not base this on political opinions. This needs to be based on the best facts we can find. Don't change our government and constitution, change those that need changed within the government.

And don't use soundbites to subvert what should be a serious discussion.