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The American People Are Not in Control Here, Man

July 13, 2006 9:29 PM

ou know, for all the talk about how the will of the American people is what steers this country, that's not a realistic portrayal of how the Founders wanted things to be run. For example, Senators were originally appointed by state legislatures rather than elected directly by the people. When you vote for president, of course, you're not voting directly for the president but, rather, for electors who then go and cast their votes for president. And the members of the Supreme Court are appointed, not elected. This means that, according to the way this country was set up at its inception, only one federal governmental body - the House of Representatives - was elected directly. The Seventeenth Amendment changed this and added the Senate. But that still means that only one branch of the government is removed from the people by only one step. The other two have increased layers of isulation.

Personally, I think this is a good compromise. The only debatable part, I think, is the electoral college, and that's only because of Fourteenth Amendment one-man-one-vote stuff. But,ost you know, you've gotta compromise when you're writing a constitution. But, of course, the Supreme Court should be accountable to nothing other than the Constitution. Those nine men and women should make decisions based on their honest interpretations of the Constitution and the law, not on what will ensure reelection. In reality, of course, the Justices make decisions based on their own idealogies, but that's ok. The Constitution is a "living document," after all. And the voice of the people is still heard in the Supreme Court, it's just not as direct: the president picks the candidate and then the Senate confirms the candidate. The votes you cast at the ballot box still have an effect, just a more attenuated one.

So why am I rehashing stuff we all learned in 4th grade civics? Just because I'm sick and tired of hearing about "activist judges." Listen up, man. The Supreme Court, along with the rest of the fucking courts, are not supposed to whatever the fuck it is that the people want them to do. Oh, sure, sometimes what the courts should do matches up with what the people want. Maybe even most of the time. But not all of the time.

The courts are flawed and undoubtedly give in to pressures. Sometimes courts overstep their bounds. And, as I've already acknowledged, judges decide based on idealogies probably more often than they should. But this post isn't about the courts - it's about the idiots out there who forget that, ideally, the courts would do the thing the law demands and not the popular thing.

The fact of the matter is that the people, through their representatives and directly, can do some pretty stupid shit. Look at how many states overwhelmingly passed the anti-gay marriage amendments. I don't know if I've made my stance on this clear before: prohibiting two people from getting married just because they're the same sex is aggresively stupid and wrong - not to mention discriminatory. Plus, what the fuck is the government, an entity that is prohibited from establishing religion, doing protecting the sanctity of anything? But I digress . . .

The anti-gay marriage stuff is just the most recent example. Poll taxes, Jim Crow laws, segregation - all terrible, discriminatory abuses of power, were directly attributable to the will of the people. Ultimately, it was the courts that started the process that got rid of these racist institutions (although it took them way too long to do it).

So that's why I hate it when people like George W. Bush, James Dobson, and Bill O'Reilly, talk about how the activist judges are circumventing the will of the people.

I'm sorry, man, but sometimes the will of the people should be circumvented.

2 Comments

kristin said:

I thought this article posed an interesting theory about why so many people are anti-gay-marriage, even when they are not ordinarily bigots.

Hate and Marriage

July 14, 2006 6:40 AM

nidhi said:

I agree that the Hate and Marriage article offers an interesting theory. But the author lost me somewhere in the middle of the article. He offers compelling evidence that more Americans oppose gay marriage than other gay rights. He then offers a theory about why, but I think that his evidence to support that theory is weak. He offers one quote from an anti-gay marriage activist and reads quite a bit into it. He also proposes that most people have a "blushing bride and chivalrous groom" image of marriage. But is that really true? It might be, but it also might not be and the article does nothing to prove it either way. So I agree that it is an interesting theory, but I need to hear more.

July 14, 2006 11:03 AM