[GCFL-discuss] Scalia

[gcfl-discuss at gcfl.net]

Hey, just to change the subject, has anyone read Justice Antonin Scalia's
excellent presentation of the Supreme Court's decision in BLAKELY v.
WASHINGTON ? Basically what he said is, no person can be sentenced in an
American court for anything a jury has not found to be true. That should
be a no-brainer, but it was only a 5-4 decision. Its one of those cases
which break up all stereotypes about "wings" to the court. Scalia,
Stevens, Thomas, Souter and Ginsburg were the majority, opposed by
Rehnquist, Kennedy, Breyer and O'Connor.

I am a little worried about the next few appointments to the court, no
matter who the president is. GWB has already shown he is anxious to
appoint fanatical ideologues intent on ripping up the Constitution of the
United States if it gets in the way of what their little pointed heads
conceive to be good for us. Clinton appointed mild-mannered pragmatists
like Breyer, who showed in this case that he is intent on ignoring the
Constitution of the United States if it gets in the way of what his
pointed little head conceives to be a reasonable measure of efficient
administration. I don't know what Kerry is going to come up with.

Scalia has a way of getting right to the point in clear language, in this
case concerning:
"the need to give intelligible content to the right of jury trial. That
right is no mere procedural formality, but a fundamental reservation of
power in our constitutional structure. Just as suffrage ensures the
people's ultimate control in the legislative and executive branches, jury
trial is meant to ensure their control in the judiciary... the judge's
authority to sentence derives wholly from the jury's verdict. Without
that restriction, the jury would not exercise the control that the
Framers intended. ... The very reason the Framers put a jury-trial
guarantee in the Constitution is that they were unwilling to trust
government to mark out the role of the jury."

It's available at www.findlaw.com under the federal and supreme court
links.

Siarlys


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