Burnt Orange Report
News, Politics, and Fun From Deep in the Heart of Texas
|
|
Burnt Orange ReportNews, Politics, and Fun From Deep in the Heart of Texas |
|
 |
 |
October 10, 2004Bush (via Dave Neiwert) makes my head spinBy Jim DallasDave Neiwert has his own spin on Bush's Dred Scott ramblings. What I find compelling here is Neiwert's linking of "strict constructionism" with "legal formalism," which lit up my student's brain when I read it. Yes, yes, Neiwert is making a totally obvious point, but you know I've been spending more time trying to learn about simple things like the statutes of fraud and personal jurisdiction, and less time pondering the forms. But what the hell. If I've learned anything about the philosophy of law so far in this first semester, it is that for atleast a century almost all credible legal scholars have considered legal formalism to be an archaic, obviously wrong theory that was laid to rest years ago. Sort of like how biologists and spontaneous generation (a theory that rose and fell contemporaneously with legal formalism), or geographers and the flat-earth hypothesis. A few weeks ago Dean Rapoport, who is probably both the smartest and also most perky person I have ever met, came down to lecture our contracts class on Wood v. Lucy, Lady Duff-Gordon. She almost had a joygasm when lecturing about Judge Cardozo's famous line in the opinion that begins with the phrase "[t]he law has outgrown its primitive stage of formalism when the precise word was the sovereign talisman..." So here we have Bush, apparently endorsing a return to legal formalism. Building a bridge to the nineteenth century, if you will. But atleast he thinks slavery is bad; his "ownership society" proposal notwithstanding. I wonder if Bush had any idea what he was talking about. I know that I surely do not. Posted by Jim Dallas at October 10, 2004 11:17 AM | TrackBack
Comments
Yeah I was coming over here to tell you about said "Dred Scott means anti-abortion" spin when I read this. http://lefarkins.blogspot.com/2004/10/dred-scott-abortion-and-originalism.html Here is a link that explains some of the rationale. The legal formalism thing is pretty weird too. Fun times . . . or not. Posted by: Melissa at October 10, 2004 12:21 PMAs a fellow law student, Jim, I don't think I can fully agree with you here. I don't see "strict constructionism" as being equal to legal formalism. Strict constructionism holds to the proposition that the people who wrote the Constitution knew what they were doing, and that we should hold ourselves to what they said, as modified by the PEOPLE. It is the province of the judiciary to adapt the Constitution to fit with the changing times we live in. I can't argue with that. However, the writers of the Constitution built in an amendment process to change it when necessary. It is through this, and not through "penumbras" found by 5 out of 9 judges to all of a sudden exist, that we should be making our adaptations. The Supreme Court and our judiciary should stick to ruling on the areas that are actually covered in the Constitution, as these are the areas that the Federal government were meant to address. Posted by: Drew at October 11, 2004 09:21 AM
Post a comment
|
|
About Us
About/Contact
Advertising Policies
Donate
Archives
May 2005
April 2005 March 2005 February 2005 January 2005 December 2004 November 2004 October 2004 September 2004 August 2004 July 2004 June 2004 May 2004 April 2004 March 2004 February 2004 January 2004 December 2003 November 2003 October 2003 September 2003 August 2003 July 2003 June 2003
Recent Entries
Nebraska Gay Marriage Amendment Overturned
Military Musical Chairs Update Firefox Texas Democratic Party: $6,300 Making Homes Nuclear Text Messages DeLay and Frist: Out of Control Chris Bell Liveblog Parental Consent Bill Tabled Done Take the Pew Test Team Musselman Kuffner Interviews Lampson Sessions to support Bonilla for Senate? Rick Perry Has New Polling Numbers! Conservatives Finally Coming Around on Marijuana Decriminalization? Well boys, I reckon this is it -- nukyular combat, toe to toe with the GOP This Headline Cannot Contain My Boiling Rage Constructive Media Criticism University Democrats Endorse Jennifer Kim
Categories
2004: Dem Convention (79)
2004: Presidential Election (570) 2008: Presidential Election (8) About Burnt Orange (126) Around Campus (144) Austin City Limits (140) Axis of Idiots (29) Blogs and Blogging (134) BOR Humor (63) BOR Sports (59) Budget (16) Burnt Orange Endorsements (14) Congress (41) Crime and Punishment (2) Dallas City Limits (100) Elsewhere in Texas (14) Get into the Action! (5) GLBT (150) Houston City Limits (29) International (96) Intraparty (39) National Politics (497) Oh, you know, other stuff. (30) Politics for Dummies (11) Pop Culture (63) Redistricting (255) Social Security (30) Texas Lege (113) Texas Politics (681) That Liberal Media (2) The Economy, Stupid (15) The Stars At Night Are Big And Bright (1)
BOR Edu.
University of Texas
University Democrats
BOR News
The Daily Texan
The Statesman The Chronicle
BOR Politics
DNC
DNC Blog: Kicking Ass DSCC DSCC Blog: From the Roots DCCC DCCC Blog: The Stakeholder Texas Dems Travis County Dems U.S. Rep. Lloyd Doggett State Sen. Gonzalo Barrientos State Rep. Dawnna Dukes State Rep. Elliott Naishtat State Rep. Eddie Rodriguez State Rep. Mark Strama
Linked to BOR!
Alexa Rating
Truth Laid Bear Ecosystem Technoranti Link Cosmos Blogstreet Blogback
Polling
American Research Group
Annenberg Election Survey Gallup Polling Report Rasmussen Reports Survey USA Zogby
Texas Stuff
A Little Pollyana
Austin Bloggers DFW Bogs DMN Blog In the Pink Texas Inside the Texas Capitol The Lasso Pol State TX Archives Quorum Report Daily Buzz George Strong Political Analysis Texas Law Blog Texas Monthly Texas Observer
TX Dem Blogs
100 Monkeys Typing
Alandwilliams.com Alt 7 Annatopia Appalachia Alumni Association Barefoot and Naked BAN News Betamax Guillotine Blue Texas Border Ass News The Daily DeLay The Daily Texican Dos Centavos Drive Democracy Easter Lemming Esoterically Get Donkey Greg's Opinion Half the Sins of Mankind Jim Hightower Houtopia Hugo Zoom Latinos for Texas Off the Kuff Ones and Zeros Panhandle Truth Squad Aaron Peña's Blog People's Republic of Seabrook Pink Dome The Red State Rhetoric & Rhythm Rio Grande Valley Politics Save Texas Reps Skeptical Notion Something's Got to Break Southpaw Stout Dem Blog The Scarlet Left Tex Prodigy ToT View From the Left Yellow Doggeral Democrat
TX GOP Blogs
Beldar Blog
Blogs of War Boots and Sabers Dallas Arena Jessica's Well Lone Star Times Publius TX Safety for Dummies The Sake of Arguement Slightly Rough
Daily Reads
&c.
ABC's The Note Atrios BOP News Daily Kos Media Matters MyDD NBC's First Read Political State Report Political Animal Political Wire Talking Points Memo CBS Washington Wrap Wonkette Matthew Yglesias
College Blogs
CDA Blog
Get More Ass (Brown) Dem Apples (Harvard) KU Dems U-Delaware Dems UNO Dems Stanford Dems
GLBT Blogs
American Blog
BlogActive Boi From Troy Margaret Cho Downtown Lad Gay Patriot Raw Story Stonewall Dems Andrew Sullivan
More Reads
Living Indefinitely
Blogroll Burnt Orange!
BOR Webrings
< ? Texas Blogs # >
<< ? austinbloggers # >> « ? MT blog # » « ? MT # » « ? Verbosity # »
Election Returns
CNN 1998 Returns
CNN 2000 Returns CNN 2002 Returns CNN 2004 Returns state elections 1992-2005 bexar county elections collin county elections dallas county elections denton county elections el paso county elections fort bend county elections galveston county elections harris county elections jefferson county elections tarrant county elections travis county elections
Texas Media
abilene
abilene reporter news alpine alpine avalanche amarillo amarillo globe news austin austin american statesman austin chronicle daily texan online keye news (cbs) kut (npr) kvue news (abc) kxan news (nbc) news 8 austin beaumont beaumont enterprise brownsville brownsville herald college station the battalion (texas a&m) corpus christi corpus christi caller times kris news (fox) kztv news (cbs) crawford crawford lone star iconoclast dallas-fort worth dallas morning news dallas observer dallas voice fort worth star-telegram kdfw news (fox) kera (npr) ktvt news (cbs) nbc5 news wfaa news (abc) del rio del rio news herald el paso el paso times kdbc news (cbs) kfox news (fox) ktsm (nbc) kvia news (abc) galveston galveston county daily news harlingen valley morning star houston houston chronicle houston press khou news (cbs) kprc news (nbc) ktrk news (abc) laredo laredo morning times lockhart lockhart post-register lubbock lubbock avalanche journal lufkin lufkin daily news marshall marshall news messenger mcallen the monitor midland - odessa midland reporter telegram odessa american san antonio san antonio express-news seguin seguin gazette-enterprise texarkana texarkana gazette tyler tyler morning telegraph victoria victoria advocate waco kxxv news (abc) kwtx news (cbs) waco tribune-herald weslaco krgv news (nbc) statewide texas cable news texas triangle
World News
ABC News All Africa News Arab News Atlanta Constitution-Journal News.com Australia BBC News Bloomberg Boston Globe CBS News Chicago Tribune Christian Science Monitor CNN Denver Post FOX News Google News The Guardian Inside China Today International Herald Tribune Japan Times LA Times Mexico Daily Miami Herald MSNBC New Orleans Times-Picayune New York Times El Pais (Spanish) Salon San Francisco Chronicle Seattle Post-Intelligencer Slate Times of India Toronto Star Wall Street Journal Washington Post
Powered by
Movable Type 3.15 |
|