Courts & Law

Our lawless legislature wants its higher campaign finance limits now!

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Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

Last month, the Arizona Court of Appeals issued a preliminary injunction against HB2593 (new higher campaign contribution limits) in a ruling in Arizona Citizens Clean Elections Commission, et al. v. The Honorable Mark H. Brain, and real parties in interest (.pdf).

Our Tea-Publican lawless legislature never tires of pissing away taxpaper dollars on litigation to defend its unconstituional acts, so naturally our Tea-Publican legislature has filed an appeal to the Arizona Supreme Court challenging the preliminary injunction (the Court of Appeals sent the case in chief back to the trial court for a decision on the merits). The Arizona Capitol Times (subscription required) reports, Lawmakers ask state Supreme Court to reinstate new contribution limits:


Senate President Andy Biggs and House
Speaker Andy Tobin asked the Arizona Supreme Court to lift an injunction
against new campaign contribution limits passed by the Legislature.

Attorney Mike Liburdi, who represents Biggs and Tobin, argued that
the Arizona Court of Appeals erred when it determined that voters
intended to fix campaign contribution limits permanently when they
approved the Citizens Clean Elections Act in 1998. He also told the high
court that it should reinstate the higher new contribution limits
contained in HB2593 because the old limits are unconstitutionally low.

The crux of the dispute over HB2593 is a provision in the Clean
Elections Act that reduces the contribution limits from a separate
statute by 20 percent. Opponents of the new limits argue that the voters
intended that reduction to set new contribution limits in perpetuity.

* * *


The Court of Appeals sent part of the
case back to the trial court, where it instructed Maricopa County
Superior Court Judge Mark Brain to hear arguments on whether Arizona’s
contribution limits are unconstitutionally low. Liburdi asked the
Arizona Supreme Court to determine whether the plaintiffs or the
defendants have the burden of proof in those arguments.

U.S. Supreme Court rejects Oklahoma abortion case, wants response from Texas

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Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

The Supreme Court took off of its docket, and thus will not decide, a plea by the state of Oklahoma to revive a law that restricts doctors’ use of drugs rather than surgery to perform an abortion with the medication RU-486 and others. Lyle Denniston at SCOTUSblog reports, Court won’t rule on RU-486 abortions:

Uterus-stateIn a one-sentence order, the Court dismissed as “improvidently granted” the case of Cline  v. Oklahoma Coalition for Reproductive Justice (docket 12-1094).   In issuing other orders, the Court granted no new cases for review.

Meanwhile, a group of women’s health clinics and doctors in Texas asked that the Court at least temporarily a new Texas law that forbids doctors to perform
abortions at a clinic unless those physicians have professional privileges at a hospital within thirty miles of that site.  The Fifth Circuit Court on Thursday allowed that requirement to go into effect, resulting in closing a number of abortion clinics across the state. The application to set aside that order was filed initially with Justice Antonin Scalia, who is the Circuit Justice for the geographic area that includes Texas. He has the authority to decide the issue himself, or share it with his colleagues.

The application is Planned Parenthood of Greater Texas Surgical Health Services v. Abbott (13A452). Justice Scalia immediately asked for the state to respond by 4 p.m. on Tuesday, November 12. The new Texas law also involved a broad restriction on doctors’ option of performing medical abortions with the drug RU-486 and other medications, and that, too, has been allowed to take effect at least in part. The abortion providers’ request to the Supreme Court on Monday, however, did not ask the Justices to take any action on that provision.

Secretary Hagel orders national guard units to comply with DoD regulations re: same-sex partner benefits

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Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

Several "Red States" have had their national guard units refuse to process requests for same-sex partner benefits, despite the Department of Defense (DoD) having brought its rules and regulations into compliance in September with the U.S. Supreme Court decision in U.S. v. Windsor, striking down Section 3 of the federal Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA).

Apparently these "Red State" Neo-Confederates have decided to engage in massive resistance to the Supreme Court's decision, much the way some of these same states did in response to the Supreme Court decision ending segregation in public schools in Brown v. Board of Education in 1954. It took Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy and Johnson nationalizing state guard units to enforce Supreme Court decisions for the desegregation of public schools. There is no reason to believe that President Obama will not faithfully execute the laws of the United States in the same manner if necessary.

Last night, Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel gave a speech to the Anti-Defamation League in which he addressed this "Red State" refusal to comply with DoD rules and regulations regarding same-sex partner benefits. Secretary Hagel's address to the ADL (excerpt):

The balance between security and civil rights sends an important message to the world. At the Department of Defense, we work to preserve America’s individual liberties as well as defend our freedom.

When the Supreme Court issued its decision on the Defense of Marriage Act this summer, the Department of Defense immediately began working on providing the same benefits to all eligible spouses, regardless of sexual orientation. We did it because everyone who serves our country in uniform should receive the full benefits they earned, fairly and in accordance with the law. Everyone’s rights must be protected.

This means that all spouses of service members are entitled to DoD ID cards, and the benefits that come with them. But several states are refusing to issue these IDs to same-sex spouses at National Guard facilities. Not only does this violate the states’ obligations under federal law, their actions have created hardship and inequality by forcing couples to travel long distances to federal military bases to obtain the ID cards they’re entitled to.

This is wrong. It causes division among the ranks, and it furthers prejudice, which DoD has fought to extinguish.

The GOP war on women: gradually eroding the constitutional right to abortion

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Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

The injunction issued by a Texas federal court earlier this week was overturned by a panel of the conservative activist Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals yesterday. Texas court reinstates abortion limits:

TalibanTexas abortion providers’ Monday victory was short-lived. The U.S. 5th
Circuit Court of Appeals on Thursday reversed a federal district court
ruling that found part of the state’s new abortion regulations
unconstitutional, meaning the provisions of House Bill 2 could take
effect immediately if state officials choose to enforce them.

* * *

A three-judge panel in the 5th Circuit appellate court lifted a
permanent injunction placed on the abortion regulations by a lower
court, arguing in a written opinion that the state was likely to succeed
in its legal arguments.

The judges, Priscilla R. Owen, Jennifer Walker Elrod and Catharina
Haynes, wrote that “there is a substantial likelihood that the state
will prevail in its argument that Planned Parenthood failed to establish
an undue burden on women seeking abortions or that the
hospital-admitting-privileges requirement creates a substantial obstacle
in the path of a woman seeking an abortion.” Furthermore, they
wrote,”we also conclude that the state has made a strong showing of
likelihood of success on the merits, at least in part, as to its appeal
of the injunction pertaining to medication abortions.”

The appellate court’s decision overrules U.S. District Judge Lee
Yeakel’s ruling on Monday that a provision in HB 2 that requires
abortion doctors to have admitting privileges at a nearby hospital
imposed an undue burden on women seeking the procedure. Additionally,
Yeakel ruled that it would be unconstitutional for the state to require
physicians to follow federal standards for drug-induced abortions if a
physician determined it would be safer for the woman to use a common
evidence-based protocol.

D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals rules against contraceptive coverage in ‘ObamaCare’ in a deeply disturbing decision

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Posted  by AzBlueMeanie:

"Corporations are people, my friend." – Willard "Mittens" Romney

Apparently the legal fiction of a corporate entity also enjoys rights far superior to the individual rights and liberties guaranteed to citizens by the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights. This is a brave new world of corporatocracy, my friends.

The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals today upheld a legal challenge to the provision of the Affordable Care Act (ObamaCare) that mandates employer coverage of birth control,
arguing that it “trammels” the expression of religious freedom.

Wait, the legal fiction of a corporate entity has a "religion" (other than profits and shareholder dividends)? And it is free to impose its religious beliefs on its employees under some perverse notion of "religious liberty"?

This is the exact opposite meaning of religious liberty: it is a "get out of jail free card" for an employer to discriminate against its employees of other religious beliefs, or no religious beliefs, who do not share the corporate entity's "religious beliefs" — under the sanction of federal law, which would violate the "free exercise" clause of First Amendment religious liberty.

Steve Benen reports, Court rules against ACA contraception policy:

Birth-control opponents wonan especially significant round this morning.

The D.C. Circuit Court has upheld a legal challenge to the
provision of the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) that mandates employer
coverage of birth control, arguing that it “trammels” the expression of
religious freedom. While the legal process over the issue isn’t final,
the decision hands a huge political victory to conservative activists
that have long made this argument.

The ruling is online here (pdf).