Change is the buzzword for the Barack Obama campaign for President of the United States in 2008.  The word “change” can mean many things, both good and bad.  One of the changes that Obama wants to make is in the Supreme Court.  It is estimated that there will be, at least, two or three vacancies in the Supreme Court in the first term of the next president.  Obama has made it perfectly clear that his choice of a Supreme Court judge will not be one like the last two judges appointed by President Bush, Samuel Alito and Chief Justice John Roberts.  Obama will appoint someone in the leftist, activist judge mode of justices Ruth Bader-Ginsburg or David Suter.  This also means that no one who is, or possibly could be pro-life, or a conservative, would ever be considered. 

There are two very distinctive philosophies in the current Supreme Court.  Those on the left are activist judges and those who are not are considered strict constructionists.  Judges Scalia, Alito and Thomas, for instance, are very much strict constructionist, while the liberal judges such as Suter, Ginsburg and Stevens are activist judges.  Activist judges believe in a “living Constitution.”  A living Constitution means that they can interpret the law to mean what they believe, regardless of whether it is in the Constitution or not.  The famous 1973 decision of Roe v. Wade is a famous example of judicial activism run amuck.  The right to an abortion is nowhere to be found in the Constitution or any of the Constitutional Amendments.   In Roe they found a “right to privacy” in the 14^th Amendment.  However, such a right is nowhere to be found in the 14^th Amendment.   So how did they justify it?  They justified it by coming up with what they called “penumbras and emanations,” meaning they somehow added a connection even though there was none.  Other famous Supreme Court decisions that used penumbras and emanations were Griswold v. Connecticut, 1965, and Planned Parenthood v. Casey, 1992. 

 If you’re still mystified by penumbras and emanations, so is everybody else.  Translation:  you can make up any connection you want from any law - in other words plain judicial tyranny.  This should scare anyone, liberal or conservative because it represents a judiciary that is out of control and not representative of anybody.  A current example of judicial tyranny just happened in California.  The California Supreme Court ruled that same sex marriage is constitutional; despite the fact that California voters voted 60% to say that marriage is between a man and a woman (Proposition 22).  Yet, five activist judges told us that they know better than the entire State population.   Where did they find it in the California Constitution?  They did not – penumbras and emanations; they made it up. 

The August 2008 issue of Townhall.com Magazine has a brilliant article by Curt Levey titled “Holding the Line.”  This article clearly describes the fallacies and outright dangers to our society that judicial activism can produce.  Levey states, “judicial activism is not the failure to follow precedent.  Courts must generally adhere to their past decisions and those of higher courts.  But, as law professor Gary Lawson notes, “if the Constitution say X and a prior judicial decision says Y, a court has not merely the power, but the obligation, to prefer the Constitution.   Judicial activism threatens, not only the rule of law, but also the American political process and, potentially, each and every American.  Because judicial activism lacks any standards, it cedes unchecked power to judges.”  

Judicial activism is a favorite of the political left and the Democratic Party.  Since most of what they want cannot happen through the ballot box, such as the definition of marriage in Proposition 22 in California, an activist court, overturns the will of the people and rules for homosexual marriage.  Activist judges are the bread and butter of the left.   A few years ago the 9^th Circuit Court ruled that in the Pledge of Allegiance,” under God” was unconstitutional, overturning the United States Congress with passed this law in 1954.  The 2-1 ruling overturns the will of the entire country’s representatives.  Laws are made by the legislatures of the states or the Congress of the United States, these some bodies can change them, but activist judges do not want legislatures to rule, they want to rule.  This is an obvious contradiction.  The job of any judge is to rule on the law, as written, not to make it.  They conveniently ignore this simple axiom. 

Many of my fellow Republicans are lukewarm about John McCain.  McCain would have been my last pick for President, but compared to what we would get in Obama, it is a slam-dunk for me to vote for McCain.  Judges is one of the reasons.  Judges are on the bench for as long as 40 years.  A liberal, leftist activist judge would do irreparable harm to the United States and the rule of law.  We would no longer be people ruled by the will of the people but by the will of one or two unelected, unaccountable judges.  This is extremely dangerous and will hurt our country.  We do not want judges who make laws, that is the job of our legislature.  Electing Obama would be the same as picking activist judges who will make law, rather than ruling on the law as written.