I do not think the majority decided based on their Catholic belief, any more than I think the minority decided based on their generally non-practicing Jewish heritage.
But I think there was “belief” involved – not religious belief, but the belief in how courts should approach situations like this. As a general rule, liberal judges are more comfortable with the idea that – especially at the Supreme Court – a judge should shape the law, and use the law to help shape social policy. There’s nothing inherently wrong about that view – the 1960’s legal landscape was shaped dramatically by judges who did just that. Mapp, Escobedo, Miranda, Gideon, Griswold – all of these were landmark cases in which the Court undertook to read something new into the law, to discover a right or freedom that was not previously part of our jurisprudence. And that’s consistent with a liberal view, in which we have an ever-evolving notion of what our society can and should be.
And in general, conservative judges see their role more as an umpire, applying the existing law but not expanding it. And that’s consistent with a conservative view, in which we seek to slow and minimize change.
No, religious belief was not involved; yes, ‘belief’ played a part: the differing belief in the wise role of a judge in our society; no, because ultimately the written law was followed.
I thought it did. I thought some of HL’s argument was based in the 2010 Federal Election Commision decision. Guess I was wrong.
[QUOTE=Bricker]
Finally, it might interest you to learn that in the past four terms, the single pair of justices who voted in lockstep most often was Kagan and Sotomayor, who voted with each other in 94% of the cases.
I’m curious to know if you will abandon your apparent distaste for voting in lockstep, or just comfort yourself that Scalia and Thomas were a close second.
Except they weren’t. Roberts and Alito (93%) came in second.
So… third?
Nope: Kagan and Ginsburg (92%).
Justices Scalia and Thomas agreed 90% of the time, tied with both Alito/Thomas and Sotomayor/Ginsburg.
I have a funny feeling that I’m not going to see any critical comments from you about Sotomayor or Kagan on this matter.
Right?
[/QUOTE]
I’d like to know why you picked ‘4 terms,’ but if you’re being honest about this, I accede to your knowledge about SCOTUS.[del] So, I ask you directly - do you think that the ‘conservative wing’ of the court follows law before ideology? Do you think the ‘liberal wing’ of the court follows law before ideology? How do you account for 4 Supremes coming to a different conclusion than the one that is so obvious and settled to you?[/del]
That’s not fair. His criticism was leveled towards the unthinking agreement supposedly demonstrated by the high degree of voting together. Learning that several other pairs of justices voted more often together than Scalia / Thomas should result in either a similar level of criticism for Sotomayor / Kagan or an admission that voting together isn’t indicative of anything deserving criticism.
One for two. I don’t go cruising liberal leaning news sites - I’ve been particularly interested in this case, and I’ve been going by top google hits on the case (including wikipedia’s article). I bring my own bias. Can’t find the link that says the corporate personhood concept that was important here was when the court expanded it from the 14th amendment to include the 1st, but saw it somewhere.
“Didn’t read the decision” I give you credit for, even though I looked at the first page or two of the pdf. I can’t claim to base any understanding of the case on that, though.
The milk-meat rule applies to meat of any mammal (from the Torah, expanded to fowl by later Rabbis) and milk of any mammal. The Talmud explains how this is derived from the verses of scripture.
But I’ll give you a different example where the above reasoning does apply: the law against slaughtering an animal and its own child on the same day (Leviticus 22:28). I’m rather certain that Rabbinic authorities don’t insist on seeing any form of pedigree and death certificate before allowing an animal to be slaughtered on a given day, due to what you mention above about modern commercial meat production. (Though the law still applies, and in an environment like a small farm where such things can be tracked with certainty, a slaughterer should indeed not slaughter parent and child on the same day.)
I’m sorry, man. It’s sad, when there’s like 47 other threads on the board discussing this subject, that the people hijacking the hell out if your topic don’t give a flying fuck about your wishes. As I’m sure you’ve ascertained by now, their political agenda is more important than what anyone else, even the OP, would want.
If you’re still looking for slogans for your sign -
I’m with stoopid! ====>
You must be this tall to ride
>-------------------------------<
Will work for food
Yes, and a very valid correction. I elided details here, specifically the distinction between mitzvot d’oraita and mitzvot d’rabbanan. But I think my basic point remains: the cooking of meat and diary together is prohibited by mitzvot d’oraita; the prohibition against having them on the same table is a gezeirah, a mitzvot d’rabbanan. Yes?
So a critic of this rule could point out that the gezeirah arises from a scientific near-impossibility.
And that same critic would have a field day with the fact that the same rule almost becomes a gezeirah l’gezeirah when chicken and diary cannot be on the same table. He might well argue that, scientifically, there is ZERO possibility that the chicken and dairy were mother and offspring.
But regardless, the mitzvot d’rabbanan of not having chicken and cheese on the same table is entitled to protection, and a government rule forcing someone to violate it would be void under the RFRA.
This is a great example of why the government should have zero–ZERO–interest in whether a religious belief is genuine or not. There’s no way that the proscription against chicken and milk together is more sensible than the Flying Spaghetti Monster.
Which isn’t to say that the government should force someone to eat chicken parmesan. Rather, the government should have a healthy dose of “I don’t care what wacky beliefs you have, as long as it’s not interfering with someone else, I’ll continue not caring.”
The RFRA is exactly the wrong attitude. It says, “We made this law for a good reason–oh, but you have a wacky reason not to follow it? Well, let’s figure out if it’s a genuine wacky reason or just a wacky reason you made up, and if it’s genuine, you don’t have to follow it.” [roughly paraphrased].
While certainly related, debate over the Supreme Court decision is clouding up with this thread. Please keep the comments confined to suggestions for the sign.
Thanks.
(PS Giraffe, twas I who ruined your spelling joke. I get twitchy when I see spelling errors in thread titles. )
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