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Conservatives Are Not Guardians of the Constitution

SonOfDaedalus

SonOfDaedalus

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When I listen to conservative radio I constantly hear them talking about how liberals don't respect the constitution. They complain about liberal judges. They insist they are defenders of constitutional freedoms.

So, who is their most beloved conservative legal mind and constitution defender? The late Justice Antonin Scalia.

So, let's see how Antonin Scalia interpreted the constitution:

Justice Antonin Scalia made headlines today when he implied the Constitution doesn't give anybody a right to engage in "homosexual sodomy."

The outspoken justice's anti-gay sentiment runs pretty deep and is shockingly apparent in a dissent he wrote back in 2003 when the court struck down Texas' sodomy law.

In Scalia's colorful dissent, he warned against forcing states to decriminalize "homosexual acts" without a democratic majority, and feared the court had taken sides in a culture war.
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Scalia Lawrence V. Texas Dissent - Business Insider

So, according to this great constitutional scholar, the constitution doesn't protect your right to perform "homosexual acts" in the privacy of your home. The government and majority can criminalize your conduct. I think the Taliban would completely agree and simply extend this kind of thinking to all kinds of acts that majority of Muslims think is immoral.

The idea that conservatives are defenders of the constitution and freedom is laughable. They only care about the 2nd Amendment. Nothing else.
 
SonOfDaedalus said:
When I listen to conservative radio I constantly hear them talking about how liberals don't respect the constitution. They complain about liberal judges. They insist they are defenders of constitutional freedoms.

So, who is their most beloved conservative legal mind and constitution defender? The late Justice Antonin Scalia.

So, let's see how Antonin Scalia interpreted the constitution:



Scalia Lawrence V. Texas Dissent - Business Insider

So, according to this great constitutional scholar, the constitution doesn't protect your right to perform "homosexual acts" in the privacy of your home. The government and majority can criminalize your conduct. I think the Taliban would completely agree and simply extend this kind of thinking to all kinds of acts that majority of Muslims think is immoral.

The idea that conservatives are defenders of the constitution and freedom is laughable. They only care about the 2nd Amendment. Nothing else.
Click to expand...

Well, it's the new mantra to energize the base. It used to be 'family values', but too many of the folks who got elected with 'family values' got caught in affairs or soliciting prostitutes, or things like that. With the 'defending of the Constitution', it's a lot about what someone will do in their personal life, but the mantra is just as meaningless, but emotionally charged.
 
SonOfDaedalus said:
When I listen to conservative radio I constantly hear them talking about how liberals don't respect the constitution. They complain about liberal judges. They insist they are defenders of constitutional freedoms.

So, who is their most beloved conservative legal mind and constitution defender? The late Justice Antonin Scalia.

So, let's see how Antonin Scalia interpreted the constitution:



Scalia Lawrence V. Texas Dissent - Business Insider

So, according to this great constitutional scholar, the constitution doesn't protect your right to perform "homosexual acts" in the privacy of your home. The government and majority can criminalize your conduct. I think the Taliban would completely agree and simply extend this kind of thinking to all kinds of acts that majority of Muslims think is immoral.

The idea that conservatives are defenders of the constitution and freedom is laughable. They only care about the 2nd Amendment. Nothing else.
Click to expand...

I've said this before, both the left and right use government to their own advantages. The left uses it for things like gun control and some social issues and the right uses it to be the morality police.
 
Conservatives are more guardians of the Constitution than liberals are though... with some obvious hypocrites like in your example. "Constituionalists" are a thing within the republican /right wing side... and I don't find any of that in left wing politics. But, I don't think it's fair for you to pick random social conservatives and blend them in with all right wing constituionalists.

The right wing in America is much more intellectually diverse than the left wing part of America. And you can see that in many distribution graphs, there is much more varience in opinions and positions amongst those on the republican side than the democrat side.
 
celticwar17 said:
Conservatives are more guardians of the Constitution than liberals are though... with some obvious hypocrites like in your example. "Constituionalists" are a thing within the republican /right wing side... and I don't find any of that in left wing politics. But, I don't think it's fair for you to pick random social conservatives and blend them in with all right wing constituionalists.

The right wing in America is much more intellectually diverse than the left wing part of America. And you can see that in many distribution graphs, there is much more varience in opinions and positions amongst those on the republican side than the democrat side.
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Really? You're just going to make the claim that the entire left doesn't respect or value constitutional rights? Both sides selectively "support the constitution" when it benefits them. Conservatives do it with their pet issues then turn around and ignore the constitution on social issues, and with liberals it's reversed. Painting it as one side valuing the constitution and the other not is pretty dishonest.
 
celticwar17 said:
But, I don't think it's fair for you to pick random social conservatives and blend them in with all right wing constituionalists.
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But it's not just some random social conservative. Three conservative justices including Scalia dissented.

I started looking into this after Roy Moore won the Republican primary in Alabama's Senate race. He was a justice in the Alabama Supreme Court who also thought homosexuality should be illegal. But voters and Bannon supported him anyway. Trump says he'll campaign for him.

Ted Cruz, the guy who came in 2nd place in the GOP primary to Donald Trump is the same mind. He was at a rally with the Duck Dynasty bigot Phil Robertson...let's take a moment to attend this Ted Cruz rally...



Again, I'm a Christian. But I'm totally against these Christian Pharisees. They're more like the a Christian version of the Taliban.

The Republican party has been completely hijacked by the theocratic authoritarians.
 
RabidAlpaca said:
Really? You're just going to make the claim that the entire left doesn't respect or value constitutional rights? Both sides selectively "support the constitution" when it benefits them. Conservatives do it with their pet issues then turn around and ignore the constitution on social issues, and with liberals it's reversed. Painting it as one side valuing the constitution and the other not is pretty dishonest.
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The left supports the idea of a "living" document...that is a COMPLETE disregard for the authority of the constitution... they think the constitution can just change simply based on new "interpretations"(which can end up being anything they want) instead of doing it the hard way(by making amendments). A "living" document means, they can appoint a supreme court judge to believe whatever they want to allow whatever they want.

It's natural though... liberals want to change things, conservatives want to keep things stabilized. It's no big surprise Liberals are the least constitutional of the bunch.
 
Though there have been occasional unconfirmed sightings, conservatives are generally thought to be extinct in Washington DC.
 
SonOfDaedalus said:
But it's not just some random social conservative. Three conservative justices including Scalia dissented.

I started looking into this after Roy Moore won the Republican primary in Alabama's Senate race. He was a justice in the Alabama Supreme Court who also thought homosexuality should be illegal. But voters and Bannon supported him anyway. Trump says he'll campaign for him.

Ted Cruz, the guy who came in 2nd place in the GOP primary to Donald Trump is the same mind. He was at a rally with the Duck Dynasty bigot Phil Robertson...let's take a moment to attend this Ted Cruz rally...



Again, I'm a Christian. But I'm totally against these Christian Pharisees. They're more like the a Christian version of the Taliban.

The Republican party has been completely hijacked by the theocratic authoritarians.
Click to expand...


But your'e trying to poison EVERYTHING Scalia did and stood for simply because his views on homosexuality..... I also disagree with his position, but his method of approach on the constitution had WAY more right than it did wrong. Your'e right, he left his principles when it came to homosexuality, probably because he was an old school christian....

On the other hand the left support the idea of a "Living" document, which essentially means there is only a constitution for formality.... it's interpretation can be changed on the fly .... WHICH IS COMPLETELY AGAINST THE WHOLE POINT of a constitution.
 
celticwar17 said:
The left supports the idea of a "living" document...that is a COMPLETE disregard for the authority of the constitution... they think the constitution can just change simply based on new "interpretations"(which can end up being anything they want) instead of doing it the hard way(by making amendments). A "living" document means, they can appoint a supreme court judge to believe whatever they want to allow whatever they want.

It's natural though... liberals want to change things, conservatives want to keep things stabilized. It's no big surprise Liberals are the least constitutional of the bunch.
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The constitution is a living document, that's why we've amended it like 30 times. Things change and so does society and government. Do you really think the constitution can stay exactly as it was in 1776 until the end of time? Conservatives are just as ready to appoint politically motivated judges who will subjectively interpret the constitution with their own biases and opinions.

You're acting like respect for the constitution is a conservative phenomenon but there is no shortage of examples of conservatives ****ting on the constitution when it's something they want. When it comes to rights on social issues the left is far more constitutional than the right. On many other things it's reversed.
 
celticwar17 said:
But your'e trying to poison EVERYTHING Scalia did and stood for simply because his views on homosexuality.
Click to expand...

The case was about police officers in Texas who arrested a gay man in his own home for having gay sex. I'm sorry but it does put his ability to objectively interpret the constitution into question. It really wasn't a tough case.

You know who does defend the constitution and freedom? The ACLU. When the government police abuse their authority, it's the very liberal ACLU that defends citizens and upholds constitutional rights. It's conservatives who hate the ACLU and support corrupt government law enforcers because they hate minorities and minorities bare the brunt of police corruption.

And when you hear Trump talking about "Merry Christmas" that's the Federal government showing a preference for a certain religion. That's church and state mixing together.
 
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SonOfDaedalus said:
When I listen to conservative radio I constantly hear them talking about how liberals don't respect the constitution. They complain about liberal judges. They insist they are defenders of constitutional freedoms.

So, who is their most beloved conservative legal mind and constitution defender? The late Justice Antonin Scalia.

So, let's see how Antonin Scalia interpreted the constitution:



Scalia Lawrence V. Texas Dissent - Business Insider

So, according to this great constitutional scholar, the constitution doesn't protect your right to perform "homosexual acts" in the privacy of your home. The government and majority can criminalize your conduct. I think the Taliban would completely agree and simply extend this kind of thinking to all kinds of acts that majority of Muslims think is immoral.

The idea that conservatives are defenders of the constitution and freedom is laughable. They only care about the 2nd Amendment. Nothing else.
Click to expand...

Are you arguing that it is unconstitutional to have laws against prostitution, incest, bestiality, bigamy or adultery?
 
RabidAlpaca said:
The constitution is a living document, that's why we've amended it like 30 times. Things change and so does society and government. Do you really think the constitution can stay exactly as it was in 1776 until the end of time? Conservatives are just as ready to appoint politically motivated judges who will subjectively interpret the constitution with their own biases and opinions.

You're acting like respect for the constitution is a conservative phenomenon but there is no shortage of examples of conservatives ****ting on the constitution when it's something they want. When it comes to rights on social issues the left is far more constitutional than the right. On many other things it's reversed.
Click to expand...


I'm really curious as to why you think that first paragraph had any relevance to anything I have said. These are poor debate tactics.

That is not what "living" document means, of course there can be amendments, that's in the constitution itself. And that is the PROPER way of changing the constitution. When "liberals" say "living document" they are not talking about amendments, they are talking about backdoor means of changing the constitution.... as contrary to Justice Scalia's philosophy of "Originalism". Many Leftists dislike the concept of originalism because it forces them to have to go for amendments for what they want instead of simply changing "interpretation". When you appoint Supreme court judges to change "interpretation" of origional constitutional script, you essentially make the document pointless.... it is so "alive" it's more like a guideline than a constitution.
 
SonOfDaedalus said:
And when you hear Trump talking about "Merry Christmas" that's the Federal government showing a preference for a certain religion. That's church and state mixing together.
Click to expand...

lol saying "Merry Christmas" is not establishing a law... nice try though...
 
celticwar17 said:
Many Leftists dislike the concept of originalism because it forces them to have to go for amendments for what they want instead of simply changing "interpretation".
Click to expand...

Originalism is really a meaningless term. Bot sides interpret the original meaning and spirit of the constitution. It's just semantic word games.

If you take an orignalist point of view, the constitution doesn't really apply to women, Black or gays which are groups that the founders didn't really intended to have these liberties and protections. It's a modern "interpretation" that says that the constitution should apply to all citizens regardless of gender, race or religion.
 
SonOfDaedalus said:
Originalism is really a meaningless term. Bot sides interpret the original meaning and spirit of the constitution. It's just semantic word games.

If you take an orignalist point of view, the constitution doesn't really apply to women, Black or gays which are groups that the founders didn't really intended to have these liberties and protections. It's a modern "interpretation" that says that the constitution should apply to all citizens regardless of gender, race or religion.
Click to expand...

Hence, there was an amendment....lol... and no the whole point of original-ism is to not have semantic word games.... though yes, there will still be disagreements, but the approach is best. If you disagree on an interpretation, get historical evidence to back up your claim on what they meant at the time.

And if you cannot come to an agreement, leave it up to the states ... the 10th amendment everyone forgets about... because all rights or laws not mentioned in the constitution goes to the states.
 
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celticwar17 said:
lol saying "Merry Christmas" is not establishing a law... nice try though...
Click to expand...

I never said it was. I said it's mixing church and state. It's the state showing a preference for a certain religion. We're a secular government.

The backlash against "Happy Holidays" is a backlash against a culture of inclusion that recognizes that there are Americans who are Jewish, Hindu, Muslim, Buddhist or atheist. The head of the government should wish everyone "Happy Holidays" instead of only wishing Christians "Merry Christmas." How can you have equal protection when the government clearly states its religious preference?
 
SonOfDaedalus said:
The case was about police officers in Texas who arrested a gay man in his own home for having gay sex. I'm sorry but it does put his ability to objectively interpret the constitution into question. It really wasn't a tough case.

You know who does defend the constitution and freedom? The ACLU. When the government police abuse their authority, it's the very liberal ACLU that defends citizens and upholds constitutional rights. It's conservatives who hate the ACLU and support corrupt government law enforcers because they hate minorities and minorities bare the brunt of police corruption.

And when you hear Trump talking about "Merry Christmas" that's the Federal government showing a preference for a certain religion. That's church and state mixing together.
Click to expand...
ACLU? You mean the Anti-American Communist Leftist Union who has never defended Christians nor Conservatives? Laughable. This is why the American Center for Law and Justice, who routinely beats the ACLU in all court cases, is preferred. Only the ACLJ will defend the Constitution as it is meant to be interpreted. Literally and as ironclad law.
 
SonOfDaedalus said:
When I listen to conservative radio I constantly hear them talking about how liberals don't respect the constitution. They complain about liberal judges. They insist they are defenders of constitutional freedoms.

So, who is their most beloved conservative legal mind and constitution defender? The late Justice Antonin Scalia.

So, let's see how Antonin Scalia interpreted the constitution:



Scalia Lawrence V. Texas Dissent - Business Insider

So, according to this great constitutional scholar, the constitution doesn't protect your right to perform "homosexual acts" in the privacy of your home. The government and majority can criminalize your conduct. I think the Taliban would completely agree and simply extend this kind of thinking to all kinds of acts that majority of Muslims think is immoral.

The idea that conservatives are defenders of the constitution and freedom is laughable. They only care about the 2nd Amendment. Nothing else.
Click to expand...

He doesn't say that in the quote, does he. He only says that there are those that do not want to associate with persons acting openly conducting homosexual acts. Personally I would go further and suppose there really are quite some that dislike the idea of furtive homosexual behavior as well, but that doesn't seem to be, what he said. One might conclude that he thinks the baker ruling was wrong, however. However, that would only be surmise based on the quote.
 
SonOfDaedalus said:
I never said it was. I said it's mixing church and state. It's the state showing a preference for a certain religion. We're a secular government.

The backlash against "Happy Holidays" is a backlash against a culture of inclusion that recognizes that there are Americans who are Jewish, Hindu, Muslim, Buddhist or atheist. The head of the government should wish everyone "Happy Holidays" instead of only wishing Christians "Merry Christmas." How can you have equal protection when the government clearly states its religious preference?
Click to expand...

That is legal and not unconstitutional... it would only be unconstitutional if there were a LAW .... see this is what I'm talking about, You don't care AT ALL about the constitution... only whatever you think is best.
 
celticwar17 said:
I'm really curious as to why you think that first paragraph had any relevance to anything I have said. These are poor debate tactics.

That is not what "living" document means, of course there can be amendments, that's in the constitution itself. And that is the PROPER way of changing the constitution. When "liberals" say "living document" they are not talking about amendments, they are talking about backdoor means of changing the constitution.... as contrary to Justice Scalia's philosophy of "Originalism". Many Leftists dislike the concept of originalism because it forces them to have to go for amendments for what they want instead of simply changing "interpretation". When you appoint Supreme court judges to change "interpretation" of origional constitutional script, you essentially make the document pointless.... it is so "alive" it's more like a guideline than a constitution.
Click to expand...

And yet conservatives are more than willing to reintrepret things to fit their own subjective views. It happens on both sides. Conservatives have not been the champions of social rights, that has been largely the left's domain.
 
RabidAlpaca said:
And yet conservatives are more than willing to reintrepret things to fit their own subjective views. It happens on both sides. Conservatives have not been the champions of social rights, that has been largely the left's domain.
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No such thing as "social rights"
 
Bassman said:
No such thing as "social rights"
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Sure there is. We have many rights, some of them social. If tomorrow they made a law that christians, conservatives, whites, or whatever category couldn't get married, own property, or vote, would you accept it as constitutional? You have many rights that are not explicitly mentioned in the constitution but fall under the umbrella of explicitly defined rights.
 
celticwar17 said:
I'm really curious as to why you think that first paragraph had any relevance to anything I have said. These are poor debate tactics.

That is not what "living" document means, of course there can be amendments, that's in the constitution itself. And that is the PROPER way of changing the constitution. When "liberals" say "living document" they are not talking about amendments, they are talking about backdoor means of changing the constitution.... as contrary to Justice Scalia's philosophy of "Originalism". Many Leftists dislike the concept of originalism because it forces them to have to go for amendments for what they want instead of simply changing "interpretation". When you appoint Supreme court judges to change "interpretation" of origional constitutional script, you essentially make the document pointless.... it is so "alive" it's more like a guideline than a constitution.
Click to expand...

Origionalism is modern day hokey. The whole idea of judicial review itself by the courts is based on constitutional interpretation and guess who was around when that interpretation took place...yup...the people who wrote the damn document.
 
RabidAlpaca said:
Sure there is. We have many rights, some of them social. If tomorrow they made a law that christians, cosnervatives, whites, or whatever category couldn't get married, would you accept it as constitutional? You have a right to free contract and under that falls marriage and a multitude of other things.
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The ONLY rights we have are those that are God given unalienable rights spelled out in both the Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution. No such thing as a "right" to health care, abortion, marriage, etc.
 
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