Sunday, November 01, 2015
Supreme Court justice Kennedy compares his own lawless rulings to the draconian oppression of the Nazis
In a recent Harvard Law School meeting, a patriotic student questioned the rights of an American citizen's (KY county clerk Kim Davis) freedom to refuse to perform the task of what they perceive to be an immoral ruling while employed by the government. Justice Kennedy's response was astounding. Move the cursor to the 50 minute mark.
How many judges do you think resigned in
the Third Reich? Three. Great respect, it seems to me, has to be given
to people who resign rather than do something they think is morally
wrong, in order to make a point. However, the rule of law is that, as a
public official and performing your legal duties, you are bound to
enforce the law. It's difficult sometimes to see whether or not what
you're doing is transgressing your own personal philosophies – this
requires considerable introspection. It's a fair question that officials
can and should ask themselves. But certainly in an offhand comment, it
would be difficult for me to say that people are free to ignore a
decision of the Supreme Court. Lincoln went through this in the Dred
Scott case. These are difficult moral questions.
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