Houston Area Liberty Campaign

HALC member “TrinityTexas77″ shot videos of many of the speakers at this event. This is the video for former Graham County AZ Sheriff Richard Mack. Videos for other speakers will follow soon. Please share but give Miss Trinity credit… Enjoy!

[By HALC.us staff]

Why the choice of Justices sitting on the bench is vitally important …and how since they’re human too, they can royally eff it up for about 300 million other people.

In this writer’s personal opinion, the following are the top five worst rulings by the U. S. Supreme Court.  This was quite a difficult task to undertake, as there has been so much from the Court that seems to fly in the face of what is “good,” “right” and Constitutional.

I will give a basic layman’s case breakdown, the Court’s decision and subsequent case history (as far as being contested further in the lower courts after being “reversed and remanded” or being overturned by subsequent U. S. Supreme Court cases.  I will also give my “gems of reasoning” as to Constitutional issues and arguments that have been or will be quoted by legal scholars for decades to come.

[In case you’re interested in other people’s take on this subject, check here, here and here for other folks’ opinions as to the top five or ten U. S. Supreme Court decisions.  My top five pretty much mirrored those reflected in these other instances.  I got the idea for this article in light of the recent clamor over the Elena Kagan nomination for U. S. Supreme Court.]

*Per curiam means “by the court.”  It’s a phrase used to distinguish the whole court’s opinion versus one judge’s opinion.  Sometimes it denotes an opinion written by the Chief Justice or Presiding Judge, or to a brief announcement of the disposition of a case by court not accompanied by a written opinion.

**Slip opinion is the second version of an opinion which is sent to the printer later in the day on which the bench opinion is released by the Court. Each slip opinion has the same elements as the bench opinion–majority or plurality opinion, concurrences or dissents and a syllabus–but contains corrections not appearing in the bench opinion. Slip opinions are posted on this Website within minutes after the bench opinions are issued and remain posted until the opinions are published in bound volumes of the United States Reports.

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[Original story from http://news.lp.findlaw.com/ap/o/1110/09-25-2009/20090925053507_23.html.  Hypertext added by HALC.us staff, photos’ sources as noted.]

By KATIE NELSON Associated Press Writer

Photo by Isaac Reese, © Institute for Justice, 2004

There are a few signs of life: Feral cats glare at visitors from a miniature jungle of Queen Anne’s lace, thistle and goldenrod. Gulls swoop between the lot’s towering trees and the adjacent sewage treatment plant.

But what of the promised building boom that was supposed to come wrapped and ribboned with up to 3,169 new jobs and $1.2 million a year in tax revenues? They are noticeably missing.

Proponents of the ambitious plan blame the sour economy. Opponents call it a “poetic justice.”

“They are getting what they deserve. They are going to get nothing,” said Susette Kelo, the lead plaintiff in the landmark property rights case. “I don’t think this is what the United States Supreme Court justices had in mind when they made this decision.”

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/opinion/2008753858_opina18ramsey.html

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[original text from Morrison Report.com, links added by HALC.us editing staff]

Summary of this week’s report: We seem to be having that “conversation about race” that Candidate Obama so stridently urged when he was trying to mislead critics concerned with his extremist associations with Rev. Wright. However, I don’t think this is quite what he had in mind.

Two recent events – the Sotomayor hearings and the Henry Louis Gates uproar – demonstrate the dangerous direction Obama wants to take America when it comes to fairness, equal justice, and race relations. The Sotomayor hearings also make it clear that we’re going to need some Republicans with more backbone than our current ones if we hope to avoid this fate.

The full report: Read the rest of this entry »