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Thursday, July 7, 2011

Justice Clarence Thomas

The following link is to an article on Justice Clarence Thomas. While I imagine every Justice has made rulings that could be considered controversial, there are several items in the story that are bizarre.

http://www.therepublic.com/view/story/SCOTUS-THOMAS_5498840/SCOTUS-THOMAS_5498840/


“He strictly avoids the give-and-take among justices during oral arguments; he has not asked a question or made a comment in more than five years.”

For five years, there has not been one question he has had regarding the cases he sat on? That does not say much about his curiosity, let alone his desire to find out all relevant information.

“he has declared that the Constitution gives states a right to establish an official religion. Prisoners, he wrote, have no constitutional right to be protected from beatings by guards. Teenagers and students have no free-speech rights at all, he said in an opinion Monday, because in the 18th century when the Constitution was written, parents had "absolute authority" over their children.”

I am hard pressed to understand how anyone could say that a prisoner cannot be protected from getting beat up by guards. There are no limits to a guard hitting a prisoner for any reason? Shades of “The Shawshank Redemption” movie.

If parents have absolute control over their children, then they should be allowed to refuse them medical care that causes their death. Does anyone seriously believe a parent has that authority? If they do not, then they do not have absolute control, and his opinion is flawed.

“But this year, under current Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., he has spoken for the court's conservative majority in significant decisions that limited the rights of prisoners, which has become his signature issue. In March, he announced a 5-4 decision that threw out a $14-million jury verdict in favor of a black Louisiana man who had been convicted of murder and nearly executed because prosecutors hid evidence that could have proven his innocence.”

If the state can hide evidence that proves a man innocent, then no one is safe in this country.

“A month later, Thomas said a state's "sovereign immunity" barred inmates from suing for damages when their freedom of religion had been violated.”

I would have thought that Christians would be outraged by this idea. If your freedom of religion is violated by the state, then there is no freedom to worship as you please. This should scare anyone.

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