By: Mary Mostert, Analyst, Banner of Liberty (www.bannerofliberty.com)
July 7, 2004
Senator Ted Kennedy, Massachusetts’ senior Democrat Senator, argued on the floor of the Senate yesterday against the Apostle Paul in a determined effort to keep Leon Holmes from being appointed by President Bush to the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas. Kennedy declared that Holmes was unfit to be a judge because he had written an article for a Catholic readership which was based on Ephesians 5 in the New Testament, which counsels husbands and wives to love each other. Kennedy even had the offensive document entered into the Congressional Record. Kenney claimed that Holmes stating the following made him entirely unfit to be approved as a Federal judge:
“The verb used in Ephesians 5:24 is hypotassetai, which means to place one's self under. The Church is to place herself under the protection of Christ and ipso facto place herself under His authority. Likewise, the woman is to place herself under the authority of the man and ipso facto place herself under his authority. Both the man and the woman are to live so that their relationship is a visible sign of an unseen reality, the relationship between Christ and the Church.”
Kennedy said of the article, written by Leon Holmes and his wife Susan,
“Judges appointed to lifetime positions on the Federal court must have a clear commitment to the principles of equality in our basic civil rights laws. Mr. Holmes' view that a woman must ‘place herself under the authority of the man’ does not demonstrate such a commitment.
In other words, Senator Kennedy, who claims to be a Catholic, is saying that any Catholic, or presumably any other Christian, who believes what the Apostle Paul said in the Bible is unfit in 2004 to be a judge. Yet, Ted Kennedy has no problem thinking himself fit to be a Senator, even after he, a married man, allowed Mary Jo Kopechne, a girl he had been partying with, to slowly drown while he swam to safety and tried to figure out a way of denying he’d even been in the car at Chappaquidick.
Certainly we can see by his behavior at Chappaquidick that he would disagree with Holmes’ view that men should “live so that their relationship is a visible sign of an unseen reality, the relationship between Christ and the Church.” Christ loved and protected the Church. A husband, the Apostle Paul said, should love and protect his wife and family, as Christ loved and protected the Church. Kennedy asked his Senate colleagues if “someone with such medieval views will dispense 21st century justice?”
The vote in support of Judge Holmes was 51 in favor of his nomination and 46 opposed. Six Democrats joined 45 Republicans to approve Holmes. Five Republicans joined 41 Democrats to oppose Holmes’ nomination. Both Democrat Senators from Arkansas not only voted for Holmes. Both of Maine’s Republican Senators, Olympia Snow and Susan Collins, voted against the Apostle Paul quoting judge.
The 17 months of filibustering against Judge Holmes in the Senate brought to mind comments made by Alan Keyes during the Independence weekend “One Nation Under God Rally” in my hometown of Provo, Utah. We are beyond judicial activism in our nation. We now are facing judicial tyranny. Constitutionally our system of government is based on the separation of powers. Tyranny existed under King George III who controlled not only the executive branch of government, but also the judiciary and the legislatures of the 13 colonies.
In July of 1776 the Continental Congress put an end to the kind of judicial tyranny outlined in the 27 royal abuses of power listed in the Declaration of Independence. Two of the abuses listed were that the king had “obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers” and “has made Judges dependent on his Will alone.” Today a minority in the US Senate is obstructing the Administration of Justice by obstructing votes on the Senate floor of Bush nominees and trying to defeat all nominees who do not support the Democrat political agenda – abortion on demand and same-sex marriage. This is not mere “judicial activism.” As Alan Keyes put it:
“Even in the midst of war abroad, we are failing to sustain our liberty at home, as we seem willing to passively let a judicial dictatorship destroy republican government of, by and for the people in this land, and coercively enforce the scouring of God from our public precincts and the dismantling of our free exercise of religious conviction.“I can think of a fate worse than being born into a generation that accepted slavery: it is to be born into the generation that renewed the bondage of slavery for millions yet unborn. And if we are not careful, that will be our fate.”
Keyes pointed out that Article III Section II of the Constitution extends judicial power “in law and equity” arising “under this Constitution, the Laws of the United States, and Treaties made…”Article III allows Congress to make “exceptions” concerning what the courts may consider. The courts are to judge existing law. No legislature in the country has passed a law allowing same-sex marriage. Therefore, how can there be a case before the Supreme Court about same-sex marriage when no legislature in the entire country has passed a law allowing it?
How can unelected judicial tyrants ruling that marriage is merely for sexual entertainment overturn thousands of years of marriage law designed for the care and protection of offspring of the couple?
Perhaps the time has come for the people to demand that their elected representatives pass a law limiting the courts to judicial action, not creating new law from the bench. Judges are not only creating new law, they then judge the implementation of their new law and then enforce it through judicial orders.
When one person makes a law, judges the law, and enforces the law– that person is a tyrant, even when we call him or her a “judge.”
To Comment: Mary Mostert