Excerpts from Supreme Court declines Pledge of Allegiance case, dated October 5, 2009:
A Florida teenager has lost his bid to have the US Supreme Court decide whether students in public schools have a First Amendment right to refuse to stand and repeat the Pledge of Allegiance.
The underlying lawsuit did not challenge the content of the Pledge. Instead, at issue was a Florida law that requires all public-school students, Grades K-12, to stand and repeat the Pledge, unless excused in writing by a parent.
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On Monday, the Supreme Court announced that it would not hear the case. No reason for the decision was offered.
In seeking high-court review of the case, called Frazier v. Smith, Mr. Frazier's lawyers had asked the justices to decide whether he and other students have a constitutional right to refuse to be compelled by the government to repeat the Pledge of Allegiance.
To resolve the case, the justices would have had to clarify a landmark 1943 ruling in which the high court declared schoolchildren in West Virginia may not be required to participate in the Pledge of Allegiance.
The issue in the Frazier case was whether the First Amendment right established in the West Virginia decision belongs to the children alone or instead extends to the children through their parents.
A federal judge in Florida agreed that the right belongs to the students and struck down the Florida law. But a federal appeals-court panel later upheld the law on grounds that the First Amendment right belongs to parents of school-age children – not the children themselves.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Florida took up Frazier's case. In a brief urging the Supreme Court to hear the appeal, ACLU lawyer Randall Marshall quoted from the 1943 West Virginia decision.
"If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion or force citizens to confess by word or act their faith therein."
Florida Solicitor General Scott Makar urged the high court to refuse to hear the case. "The state, of course, recognizes that minors have constitutional rights, albeit more limited ones than adults, especially in the area of education," Mr. Makar wrote in his brief to the court. "The state's clear legal position is simply that minors' rights must be balanced against those of their parents and the interests of the government in the education context."
In a friend-of-the court brief, two advocacy groups, the Center for Constitutional Rights and Public Good, said the appeals-court opinion in the Frazier case is a departure from a long and unbroken line of decisions.
"In upholding a Florida statute that limits students' clearly established right to abstain from reciting the pledge of allegiance in school, the court of appeals created a new parental right to control the exercise of their children's conscience," Seth Mermin wrote in the brief.
So, the government position is that children can be required to stand and recite the Pledge unless their parent/guardian requests in writing that they be excused.
This isn't good enough.
The Left - how else should I describe them? - wants it to be an individual student right to exercise their conscience.
What if a student feels that, as a matter of conscience, he shouldn't be compelled to go to school at all? Does he need someone's permission?
What's at issue here is whether children are children, and whether adults can set any rules at all for them.
Because, if you decide that children have individual rights the same as adults, then
1) Pedophilia will no longer be a crime; it will be open season on kids of any age for any purpose.
2) Children will need to vote. Presidential elections will be decided in favor of whoever promises the most toys. (That's kind of what we have now.)
3) Children will need career opportunities. No more child labor laws. Career opportunities will have to include anything that can help them get ahead. That will include the military; specifically, that will include combat.
Well, perhaps I am taking this too far.
We all know it will never get that far. ;)
Let's focus on one key quote:
The American Civil Liberties Union of Florida took up Frazier's case. In a brief urging the Supreme Court to hear the appeal, ACLU lawyer Randall Marshall quoted from the 1943 West Virginia decision.
"If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion or force citizens to confess by word or act their faith therein."
I love it when the Left makes a stand on principle. :)
From Sandra Fluke: Slurs won't silence women, dated March 14, 2012:
Editor's note: Sandra Fluke is a third-year law student at Georgetown University Law Center and has served as president of Georgetown Law Students for Reproductive Justice.
snip
Most recently, certain political commentators have started spreading misinformation about the underlying government regulation we are discussing. To be clear, through programs such as Medicaid, the government already does and should fund contraception coverage for the poorest women in our country.
But, despite the misinformation being spread, the regulation under discussion has absolutely nothing to do with government funding: It is all about the insurance policies provided by private employers and universities that are financed by individual workers, students and their families -- not taxpayers.
Georgetown is the oldest Jesuit and Catholic university in the United States.
Established in 1789, Georgetown is the nation's oldest Catholic and Jesuit university. Drawing upon this legacy, we provide students with a world-class learning experience focused on educating the whole person through exposure to different faiths, cultures and beliefs. With our Jesuit values and location in Washington, D.C., Georgetown offers students a distinct opportunity to learn, experience and understand more about the world.
Ms. Fluke clarifies that the topic at hand is the private sector, not the government.
Why does the private sector have to compromise on its core beliefs?
Where is the private sector's right to exercise its conscience without permission from the government? (A principle upon which this country was founded...)
Or, suppose it is a basic economic issue - suppose the insurance company does not cover a certain type of product or service because the company has made the business decision to target a certain part of the market. Suppose the company merely wants to try to keep costs down.
What the Left is trying to do here is force its beliefs on everyone. The Left wants to take the big hammer of government and use it to bludgeon all dissent.
When this goal can be supported by making a plea for freedom, that is what they do - such as when the Left supports a kid's desire to not say the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag of the country that is paying for his education, without having to have a letter from his parent on file.
When this goal can be supported by taking away freedom, that is what they do - such as compelling a business to offer a certain product or service, regardless of economic considerations, and regardless of whether offering that product or service goes against the core beliefs of the founders of that business.
What is constant here is the desire to destroy what is right about this country.
When I say the Pledge, I gladly do so, knowing I am pledging allegiance to a flag and to a nation which is represented by that flag, a nation where Jesuits can be Jesuits and Catholics can be Catholics, and I can agree or disagree with them, as I see fit.
The Left is against this. The Left wants to bludgeon Catholics into being less Catholic, the Left wants to bludgeon the business sector into being less businesslike, and the Left wants to bludgeon anyone who would dare to be American into being less American.
To be sure, there are people on the "Left" who really believe they are working for freedom. But, they need to understand that their movement was long ago hijacked by those who seek to destroy this country... just as those who truly wanted "Peace, Land, Bread" had their movement hijacked nearly a century ago in Russia.
Ms. Fluke, I am not questioning your integrity, I am not questioning your motives, and I am not making slurs about you.
But, I am questioning the wisdom of the position that you have gone out of your way to advocate publicly.
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