Supreme (Court) Ego

If you are a follower of the Supreme Court, then you have heard about the flap over citing Foreign Law or court decisions in deciding Supreme Court cases here.

If not, here it is in a nutshell.

There are a group of folks, including some Supreme Court Justices, who think it is ok to reference Foreign Laws and Courts. Their reasoning is basically: 'Hey, there are lots of smart people in the world. We should try to learn what we can from them'.

There are another group of folks who say basically: "Hey - we are deciding American Constitutional issues. No Foreign Law or Court has anything to say about this most American of issues - our constitution."

The reason I have always thought that this matters: The REAL reason some judges want to appeal to Foreign reasoning is that they are trying to 'fix' the United States!. They do this by 'interpreting' the constitution so that it fits their pre-conceived notion. And as Mark Levin states

“The arbitrary application of foreign law — which provides an activist justice with an infinite smorgasbord of legal options — is a rejection of the predicate for America’s governmental system. And it lasts as long as the next opinion.”

It gives you a 'living' Constitution - which is, in reality, no Constitution at all. And it re-enforces the Liberal notion that the Constitution means what the Supreme Court says it means!

This is all well and good. You can agree with my take on it our not. But, in this article, a new wrinkle made its way into my thinking. Justice Ginsberg is quoted as saying:

She added that the failure to engage foreign decisions had resulted in diminished influence for the United States Supreme Court.

The Canadian Supreme Court, she said, is “probably cited more widely abroad than the U.S. Supreme Court.” There is one reason for that, she said: “You will not be listened to if you don’t listen to others.”

WOW! I find that STUNNING. A sitting member of our Supreme Court is worried about her global influence and that of the Court! We need to cite other courts so that they will cite ours! I say this is utter NONSENSE. I do not care what other countries think of how we adjudicate our own Constitutional issues. Our Constitution is unique in the world.

People, we are a great and unique country. The rest of the world has fallen behind us in nearly every way. Why then, should we look to a French or German court in deciding what OUR constitution means? We shouldn't. If you want to look around for ideas on education or tax policy, fine. But our Constitution is unique - looking elsewhere for advise on how to understand it is....embarrassing.