steve crisp's blog

think before you vote. here's why....

 abuse

In what may be seen as a landmark decision by the United States Supreme Court, the Justices recently affirmed the Constitutionality of the death penalty by lethal injection. The question before the court was if that method of execution was reasonable or if it constituted cruel an unusual punishment under the 8th Amendment. A seven to two majority found that it was not only not unusual, but not cruel, the latter being the crux of the suit.

Yet in his dissent, Justice John Paul Stevens (of emminent domain fame) railed against the death penalty and its very existence. The seminal portion of his decision read:

The death penalty represents "the pointless and needless extinction of life with only marginal contributions to any discernable social or public purposes. A penalty with such negligible returns to the state [is] patently excessive and cruel and unusual punishment violative of the Eighth Amendment.'"

Uh, Justice Stevens, it is not your job to determine the legitimacy of the death penalty, to play sociologist, to determine that you disagree with the will of the people, and to overturn a statute on those bases. It is your job to determine the Constitutionality of a law.

Nothing more. Nothing less.

There is no question that the Framers of our Constitution firmly held the belief that the death penalty was a legitimate form of punishment. When the 8th Amendment was written and ratified, the death penalty was available to judges all over our new nation as a sanction against the most heinous of crimes. Had those men who ratified that document felt the death penalty was cruel and unusual, they could have easily banned it Constitutionally. Indeed, they not only did not do such, but within the 5th Amendment gave tacit permission to impose the greatest of penalties.

Note the 5th:

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, when in actual service in time of war or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

The notion of a capital crime and its implied punishment is found in the very first clause. And just how can one be put in jeopardy of life or deprived thereof without due process of law unless the taking of that life via the death penalty was considered legitimate in the first place?

Yet Justice Stevens wants to impose his idiotic leftist views on the legitimacy of the death penalty and impose them to Constitutionally negate over 200 years of law as well as 10,000 years of human convention. And he does so not with Constitutional rationality, but through the stirrings of his own heart and what he believes to be right and wrong.

In this instance, the death penalty is right, and Justice Stevens, you are wrong.

Wrong not only in your social opinion, but also in failing to uphold your task in determining legal legitimacy within the context of the Constitution.

It is the Constitution and the rule of law that matter in this country and makes it the shining beacon that it is. Yes, if we feel that a law is unjust, we have the full opportunity to ignore that law, flaunting it even. And should law enforcement want to make an example of us, we have the full opportunity to have our voice heard in an appropriate venue within the Constitutionally mandated court system. Ultimately, it is the task of those nine men and women to decide if our willful decision to ignore the law is merited or if the Constitution is clear that we are in the wrong.

In that vein, should the people of the United States desire to pass a Constitutional amendment requiring the consumption of a Hostess cupcake each and every Monday morning, then until that amendment is repealed, one had better chomp down on that cupcake in a timely manner of suffer the consequences.

It is not the job of the Justices to determine that studies indicate eating cupcakes may be bad for your health, or that Hostess is not Constitutional since they don't offer papaya-flavored cupcakes, and therefore overturn the Constitution on those grounds. It is their sole task to determine if not eating cupcakes is in violation of the Constitution. And in this clear case, they would have to find in the affirmative should the issue ever arise.

Now, think about all that when you step into the voting booth and determine who you wish to be president of the United States, because beyond his role as commander in chief of our military, the single most important thing he does is nominate Supreme Court Justices.

Do you want a president who is going to nominate a pack of Justice Stevens? Or do you want a president who will nominate justices who will uphold the Constitution without regard to their own personal feelings, international law, UN missives, papal encyclicals, or  the lunatic ravings of a radical leftist fringe?

In that light, I'll take a flawed McCain any day over the moonbat duet of Hillary or Obama.