Tag: Justice Anthony Kennedy

Anthony Kennedy Says Loss Of Decency Is a Threat to Democracy

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Kennedy

by Kevin Daley   Retired Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy warned university students that democracy is endangered by the decline of free and open civic debate. “We have a social framework of decency that we’re very quickly losing,” Kennedy said, according to the San Francisco Chronicle, which was on hand during the recent event at the UC Hastings College of Law. Without that framework, he explained, free societies cannot endure. Elsewhere in his remarks, the justice bemoaned the “egocentrism that the cyber age has brought us.” “Our young people in the cyber age don’t think the past is important,” Kennedy said. “If it’s not on your screen, it’s not important.” The importance of civil, wide-ranging discourse was a major touchstones of Kennedy’s jurisprudence during his tenure on the Supreme Court. Even in closely-divided cases touching hot social controversies, the justice emphasized the respect due to all parties and extolled the virtue of free expression. Perhaps the most significant of Kennedy’s opinions was the 2015 Obergefell v. Hodges ruling, which established the constitutional right to same-sex marriage. There he repeatedly argued that the decision’s detractors had good faith objections to same-sex unions which should be aired in a respectful exchange of views. “Many…

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Commentary: Democrats Show Symptoms of ABKDS (Acute Brett Kavanaugh Derangement Syndrome)

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Brett Kavanaugh

by Jeffery Rendall   In a modern American culture where people hardly agree on anything, one thing is crystal clear to everyone these days: if you turn your back on someone, you’re insulting them. That’s exactly what’s happening on Capitol Hill as Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh is receiving the cold shoulder and a chilled reception from minority party Democrat senators as he makes his rounds to meet with as many lawmakers as possible prior to his upcoming confirmation hearings. Democrats aren’t just turning their backs on Kavanaugh though – they’re outright denying him entrance to their offices. As would be expected, Democrats’ reasons for the snub aren’t very convincing. Susan Ferrechio of the Washington Examinerreported, “Many Senate Democrats have refused to hold the traditional meet and greet events with Supreme Court nominee Judge Kavanaugh, arguing they have not received all of the millions of pages of documentation related to Kavanaugh’s time working in the Bush White House. “Their shut out could ultimately delay the confirmation process and has prompted a threat from Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., to keep the Senate in session until Election Day if that time is needed to confirm Kavanaugh. “Republicans want to confirm Kavanaugh by…

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Steve Gill Commentary: The Californication of the Teachers’ Union

Tennessee Star Staff
NEA

At the recent National Education Association (NEA) Annual Meeting, where Tennessee Education Association (TEA) representatives participated along with other affiliates across the country, the highly partisan NEA took strong positions against immigration reform  and Republicans in general.  They even gave an award to controversial former NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick to honor his activism in leading protests against the National Anthem. Now NEA President Lily Eskelsen Garcia has weighed in on the US Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh.  Not surprisingly the NEA opposes Kavanaugh.  Their opposition is NOT based on his rulings as a Court of Appeals Judge, but primarily upon the hysterical concerns generated in liberal circles with completely bogus claims about recent Supreme Court rulings.  For example, she claims the Supreme Court  weakened the right of educators and other working people to come together in their unions and through collective bargaining to advocate for fair pay, benefits, and working conditions (Janus v. AFSCME, a 5-4 vote). Janus actually granted teachers and others the freedom NOT to be forced to join a union if they didn’t want to. And the “Muslim ban” that the Supreme Court confirmed, where travel from certain countries was restricted based on national security interests and…

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Senate Looks Poised To Confirm Kavanaugh

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Brett Kavanaugh

by Robert Donachie   A cloud is looming over the Senate Tuesday and its name is D.C. Circuit Judge Brett Kavanaugh. Trump nominated Kavanaugh Monday evening to officially replace retiring Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy. The nomination has riled conservatives who are hungry to see a Supreme Court champion conservative causes, but has also struck fear in Democrats. [ RELATED: Kavanaugh’s Record Is Deeply Conservative ] In the larger Senate conference, Republicans made clear Tuesday they believe Kavanaugh is a well qualified, highly respected judge that should make it through the confirmation process, acknowledging there will likely meet a few bumps in the road. “Well, I’m sorry to say that Judge Kavanaugh seems to have already broken that record — because Senate Democrats were on the record opposing him before he’d even been named, before the ink was even dry on Justice Kennedy’s resignation,” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said in a statement late Monday evening. This is a tell-tale sign that some of our colleagues are throwing thoughtful, independent judgment out the window and are outsourcing their thinking on this matter to far-left special interest groups.” The fight from Democrats is a concern for many within the Republican conference, but only…

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President Trump Meets with Supreme Court Candidates

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Donald Trump

President Donald Trump says he met Monday with four candidates for the Supreme Court and plans to meet with two to three more as he seeks to nominate a replacement to succeed retiring Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy. Trump told reporters in Washington Monday that the candidates he met with are “incredible people in so many different ways, academically and in every other way.” White House Spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Trump met with each candidate for roughly 45 minutes on Monday. She did not reveal the names of the candidates but said Trump is looking for someone who will uphold the U.S. Constitution and who has the “right intellect” and “right temperament.” When asked if Trump is looking for a candidate that will overturn Roe v. Wade, the landmark Supreme Court ruling on abortion, Sanders reiterated Trump’s stance that he is not asking the candidates their views on abortion rights. “The president is pro-life, but in terms of the process of selecting a Supreme Court nominee, as the president said last week, he is not going to discuss specific cases with the nominees,” Sanders said. Trump said Friday that he thinks the topic of Roe v. Wade is “inappropriate…

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Commentary: Liberals’ Misleading Spin on Senate Republicans’ 2016 Supreme Court Confirmation Approach

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Diane Feinstein, Chuck Schumer

by Thomas Jipping   Recent remarks by Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., show the script that the left will be using to oppose President Donald Trump’s Supreme Court nominee to fill the vacancy from the retirement of Justice Anthony Kennedy. The most prominent point so far is that the Senate should wait until after the 2018 election to consider Trump’s nominee. Echoing Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., Feinstein, speaking in the Senate Judiciary Committee’s June 28 business meeting, said following the traditional confirmation pattern would be hypocritical. Ranking member Feinstein, echoed by Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., claimed – as every Democrat and their left-wing allies will certainly do – Republicans set a “new standard” in 2016 that the Senate should never consider any Supreme Court nominee in any election year. If Republicans had taken that position in 2016, it certainly would have been new and Democrats might well benefit from it today. But that standard has never existed: not before, not during, and not after 2016. [ The liberal Left continue to push their radical agenda against American values. The good news is there is a solution. Find out more ] The Constitution gives the power to nominate and, subject to the Senate’s…

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Commentary: How Do You Spell Game Change in 2018? S U P R E M E C O U R T

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Supreme Court Justices

by Jeffery Rendall   Another Kennedy leaving Washington has Republicans giddy, though this particular one has no relation to the famous (infamous?) clan from Massachusetts Bay. It’s old news by now but Associate Justice Anthony Kennedy announced he’s stepping down from the Supreme Court on Wednesday, sending the nation’s capital into a tizzy and wiping virtually everything else – including the phony illegal immigrant family separation “crisis” – off the news wires. There’s nothing quite like an impending Court vacancy to wrest the political chatterers’ attention from their all-complain-all-the-time stupors and get them focused on something really imperative. Yes, Kennedy’s deciding to hang up the long black robe after three full decades is a big deal, not only for the future direction of the Supreme Court but also for Americans’ liberties in general. Needless to say, this year’s crucial midterm campaigns just received a shot of new energy and enthusiasm, especially for Republicans in red states challenging increasingly vulnerable Democrat senate incumbents. It’s often said fortunes can turn on a dime and it may actually come true for Republicans — and conversely, Democrats — this year. While conservatives received Kennedy’s news with happiness and anticipation, the anti-Trump resistance was angry, defiant…

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Justice Neil Gorsuch Sworn In

Tina LaFleur
Tennessee Star

  A little more than a year after the sudden death of beloved Justice Anotin Scalia, President Donald Trump introduced Judge Neil Gorsuch to take the Oath of office to be the next Associate Justice on the Supreme Court Monday. Following a private swearing to the Oath of Office all federal officials must take by Chief Justice John Roberts, Justice Anthony Kennedy officiated a public swearing to the Oath of Office of Supreme Court Justices, making Gorsuch the 113th Justice to sit on the court. Right Side Broadcasting covered the event, held outdoors in the White House Rose Garden: The Oath of the Supreme Court Justice is: I, Neil M. Gorsuch, do solemnly swear that I will administer justice without respect to persons, and do equal right to the poor and to the rich, and that I will faithfully and impartially discharge and perform all the duties incumbent upon me as Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States under the Constitution and laws of the United States. So help me God. Justice Gorsuch’s elevation to the Supreme Court restores the full bench of nine jurists. Reuters reported: Donald Trump reveled in the biggest political victory of his presidency at a…

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