sorry if this has been asked… a quick search on the message board turned up nothing.
Was the court legally allowed to jump in and pre-empt the SoS certifying the election this Saturday? I would figure that they couldn’t get involved until the SoS did it, and then a lawsuit was filed by the dems.
Anyone know the law? Seems to me that they overstepped their legal authority, but since the republicans aren’t bitching, maybe not…
I asked a lawyer friend of mine and he basically said that since their the Supreme Court of their state, they can do such things. He felt that the Court enjoined the SoS because they wanted to sort out the pending litigation before them and didn’t want to have issue muddled even further.
However, this was a discussion between plays of a football game, so I wouldn’t accept this as legal doctrine.
But how is this action stopping it from “muddling it further”? As I see it, they’ve muddled the issue by doing a pre-emptive strike. Neither Republicans nor Democrats brought anything to them… there was no motion filed… no pending action. It was basically 7 people sitting around watching CNN and deciding “whoa, now! Let’s jump in before we have to and take control of this situation.”
No doubt the SoS was going to do it. But she hadn’t yet. Seems like they had no actual “action” to take action on.
(Of course, it should be obvious to everyone that I don’t know what the hell I’m talking about.)
I think the Supreme Court may have thought that since they had already issued an order allowing the hand recounts to continue in Palm Beach County for the time being, they opted to enjoin the SoS from certifying the result.
I guess. I’m starting to lose track and my head hurts.
I think, as Bob said, that they already ordered the hand count to continue and that the Secy of State must have a good reason not to, and the latest order is a supplemental order enjoing the Secy of State from being in contempt of court. The Secy has not stated a good reason not to.
Every court has the inherent power to issue injunctions for the purpose of maintaining the status quo in a given situation until the court can resolve the legal issues surrounding that situation.
All the court’s order was intended to do was to maintain the status quo until they can decide whether Ms. Harris is abusing her discretion by refusing to include the recount votes.
People (including the Gore camp) are reading too much into this order. The court is essentially putting a “pause” on the action until they have a chance to consider the matter. It should not be read as a “foreshadowing” of how they will ultimately rule. They may well rule in Ms. Harris’s favor.
An example of how the power of injunction might be used in an everyday situation:
Let’s say Mr. A and Mr. B both claim title to a piece of land. Mr. B actually has a deed, but Mr. A contends the deed was fraudulently obtained.
Now Mr. A learns that Mr. B is about to sell the property to Mr. C. The court in that situation might well issue an injunction to prohibit the sale until the court has time to decide the legal dispute Between Mr. A and Mr. B.
And no, the court doesn’t have to wait until a party makes a motion. They can decide to issue an injunction and freeze the action “on their own motion.”
I was under the impression that the Gore folk had filed an appeal from one of the lower court decisions, and that was what triggered the sua sponte motion from the Supreme Court, since the matter was now before them - but I could well be confused - you need a scorecard to keep all the legal action straight.