nice to see an argument, ustwo. serious about that.
the bill you cite is really curious--it appears to be centered around the assumptions of the original intent "school" of far right jurisprudence--ratification of this bill would pass this stuff into law--the business about restricting what materials can be used in interpreting the constitution
Quote:
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In interpreting and applying the Constitution of the United States, a court of the United States may not rely upon any constitution, law, administrative rule, Executive order, directive, policy, judicial decision, or any other action of any foreign state or international organization or agency, other than English constitutional and common law up to the time of the adoption of the Constitution of the United States.
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seems patently absurd, the grounds for a kind of reactionary legal revolution--teh elimination of all precedent from the ratification of the constitution onward as guides for interpreting the constitution? isn't that a basic redefinition of the entirety of the american system of constitutional law? and how would this work exactly?
wouldnt there be basic problems of legality that would arise along with these extra- or pre-constitutional interpretive guidlines? the "logic" of the above seems problematic historically as well as legally (what about the end of the revolution? would that not put kind of a endpoint to the applicability of english constitutional and common law? what abotu the articles of confederation period?)
if american law starts with the adoption of the constitution, what relevance would traditions that predate that approval have?
it seems like the far right has decided that it woudl prefer the states live under a civil law tradition--what the above amounts to is throwing out everything about the precedent-based system that the us has worked under since 1789.
it seems like a crackpot proposal, doesnt it?
if i understand this bill correctly, it is far more dangerous than was made out to be earlier in the thread.
maybe the vermont guardian underplayed what a crackpot proposal this law is. it only get sworse when you try to explain it, ustwo.
with reference to the case at hand, if this bill were to become law, would you not have to draw on 18th century english legal precedents that define what is and is not a religion and go from there? so anything and everything not protestant would be equally not a religion, yes?