The Supreme Court

This would be a post y'all would come to expect on DecaturConservative, but I chose to put it here since I feel that it's really a Decatur issue.

Our president, like him or not, has the opportunity to select one, probably two, and possibly three Supreme Court justices during his second term. I know it will be hard for some, but try to put aside all the rhetoric about the left and right and what have you. Think about the eminent domain case; think about other recent rulings the Supreme Court has made that left you scratching your head. Is this what was intended when our Constitution was drafted? Would James Madison, John Dickinson, Alexander Hamilton, George Washington, and the other Framers of the Constitution have envisioned these rulings?

I've heard a lot of talk about conservatives and liberals, leftists and rightwingers; now there are new terms I've been hearing: originalists and activists (descriptive terms of a judge.) An originalist is someone who adheres to the original job description, if you will, of interpreting the Constitution as it is written, and doesn't add anything of their own in. An activist is someone who may or may not adhere to the Constitution (see eminent domain case) and who definitely adds in their own ideas (or the ideas of foreign governments.)

Now you're asking yourself, how does this apply to Decatur, Illinois?

We're a town of 85,000 people, living around acres of farm land, with factories processing beans and corn, making products to ship overseas, with people who have lived here for generations. We've grown up here on land that has been ours for over a hundred years. We own our homes, we attend our churches, we take care of our families. We want our government to be the same government that it has always been: Three branches, interdependent, checks and balances, and no one with domination over the other. However, with an activist judge, this changes all that. An Amendment to the Constitution has been trumped by activist judges. Parental rights have been trumped by activist judges. Even celebrations of our religious heritage are considered acceptable in one state and deemed unconstitutional in another, all because of activist judges. I don't want my town's heritage to change simply because an activist judge thinks it should. If anything changes to any radical degree, then it must come as a result of the vote of the people. The Constitution does NOT change, unless amended by the people. We as people may change, but the Constitution DOES NOT.

The time of activist judges needs to stop now. I don't care whether Bush appoints democrats or republicans to the Supreme Court, I just hope he appoints someone who will be an originalist. For our nation, yes, but also for my family and me. And for Decatur, Illinois.