The Contradictory World Of Strict Constructionists

If the new Supreme Court Chief Justice, John Roberts is indeed a "strict constructionist", then he opened his lifetime career on the bench with a sour note. When the case involving the assisted suicide issue from Oregon was to be argued by both sides, Roberts almost instantly interrupted before any side could argue their side of the case and seemed to make a strong statement against the 10th Amendment which gives any powers to the state that are not expressly stated as federal powers. In the case of Oregon's assisted suicide law, Roberts will almost certainly hand down an opinion that states cannot set their own medical regulations, and award that power to the federal government. But when an issue of abortion is brought before the court, then the contradictory oppposite opinion will no doubt be issued from Roberts, Miers, Thomas, Scalia and maybe others, that Roe v. Wade be overturned and the individual states set policy regarding whether abortion is legal or not, and regulations over this medical procedure should be decided by the states. Such is the silly and contradictory world of the conservative "strict constructionists".

Besides a twofaced approach to issues of state's versus federal powers, and a two faced approach to the 10th Amendment, this flimsy view of law based on political ideology rather than an honest interpretation of the wording of the U.S. Constitution and Bill Of Rights has no consistent grounding in the wording or intent of these documents, but is solely intended to promote a conservative political ideology. It was only a few days ago that Roberts told the Senate during his confirmation hearings that he would give a fair hearing to all parties in the Supreme Court. But as the assisted suicide case pointed out, Roberts interrupted any arguments to pretty much state his decision of the case without even hearing a single argument. The worst fears of some about Roberts appear to already be fulfilled.

If strict constructionists were to rule on Brown v. Board Of Education, today, then American schools would still be segregated, Blacks would hold less worthwhile jobs, hold far less political offices such as mayors, or even hold positions as police chiefs or even policemen. If the Supreme Court cannot order broad social policy changes in their decisions from the bench, then America becomes a socially backward country where the difficult process of attempting to amend the U.S. Constitution would be involved to move so many issues forward for America. Segregation, if not slavery may even still be fact of life if strict constructionism was the guiding principle of law in America.

Another problem is that congress tends to pass complex laws that are not clearly written, that sometimes are 3,000 pages long, and that most members of congress never even bothered to read before the bill was voted on. This involves entire passages or sections that are clearly unconstitutional, not well written, nearly impossible for normal compliance by those affected, or even contradictory with other sections, or with past standards set by previous Supreme Court decisions. Justices in opinions need to strike portions of bad legislation or to clarify concepts into a constitutionally acceptable form to clean up part of this legal mess that congress creates in sloppy bill construction.

Conservatives love the ring of "strict constructionist" to their ears. But the sharp limitations of this silly approach to law moved along by mere ideology, rather than a more consistent approach to sensible law based on the wording or intent of the constitution, or that the constitution must be viewed as a living and evolving document to answer the modern issues that confront the constitution written in the 1700's as the guiding priciples for the American way of life, involve a deeper and more dependable vision of honest evaluation of law in an evolving nation.