July 30, 2010 
Limbaugh: Another Day, Another Federal Assault on Liberty
By David Limbaugh July 30, 2010 7:10 AM
Yesterday’s federal court decision to enjoin enforcement of the Arizona immigration law is the latest example of a virtually unchecked renegade federal government waging war against the states and against the liberties of its citizens. We’ve seen that Obama will exercise any power he can get away with, from strong-arming secured creditors and favoring unions as he gobbled up automakers to making a mockery of due process with his Oval Office shakedown of BP. But he might have reached a new low with his assaults on the sovereignty of the people of Arizona.
Indeed, Judge Susan Bolton’s disgraceful decision to grant an injunction against Arizona’s new immigration law is, in the words of Mark Levin, “abominable,” but let’s not forget that this case wouldn’t have been before Judge Bolton if Obama’s Justice Department hadn’t initiated it.
And let’s not pretend that Obama’s motives are anything other than political, the law and the rule of law be damned. He told Sen. Jon Kyl in a private meeting that he was unwilling to secure our borders because it would decrease his chances to pass “comprehensive immigration reform.”
So when Arizona attempted to exercise a little self-help and work on securing its own border by passing a law carefully crafted to mirror the federal immigration law and encourage its enforcement, the all-powerful Obama feds came down on it like a furious king against his disobedient subjects.
In a saner world, freedom lovers could have rested easy, knowing that an impartial, Constitution-respecting judge would summarily reject the administration’s unlawful scheme to thwart Arizona’s sovereignty by superimposing its own nonenforcement policy.
But in her decision, Clinton appointee Bolton demonstrated how dangerous judicial activism can be to our individual liberties and democratic processes. It’s one thing for a court to invalidate a law because it doesn’t pass constitutional muster; it’s quite another for it to misstate the facts, the legislation and the Constitution to reach a preordained decision.
Just consider three outrages of this decision highlighted by other commentators, any of which, individually, makes a mockery of justice. Andy McCarthy properly observes that Judge Bolton stretched the federal pre-emption doctrine to absurd limits. Under Bolton’s specious reasoning, state law must be struck down not only if it is inconsistent with federal law, which the Arizona law is not, but also if it somehow contradicts federal law enforcement practices. Because the Obama feds refused, as a matter of policy, to enforce their own law against illegal immigration, the state could not be allowed to pass a law promoting enforcement. Note that nothing in the actual Constitution or case law justifies such an extrapolation of pre-emption doctrine. But such trifles don’t impede an administration and court determined to keep the immigration floodgates open at any cost.
Mark Levin notes that Judge Bolton correctly enunciated the rigorous legal standard required for a plaintiff to succeed in a “facial challenge” to a law’s constitutionality but then proceeded to ignore the rules she had just affirmed. She acknowledged that for the federal government to have prevailed, it would have had to show the law could never be applied in a constitutional fashion. That is, “a facial challenge must fail where a statute has a ‘plainly legitimate sweep.'” But she ignored that limitation on her authority, just as she violated another principle she paid lip service to in her opinion: that the court was not to speculate about hypothetical cases.
Heather Mac Donald exposes Judge Bolton’s acquiescence to the Obama administration’s “carefully cultivated fiction” that the administration’s primary motive with the lawsuit was to prevent the application of the law to legal aliens. The judge ignored uncontroverted testimony and legal briefs from Arizona officials stating that only people who were reasonably suspected to be illegally in the country would be required to prove their legal status. So to protect legal aliens from a law that doesn’t apply to them, she refuses to apply the law to illegals.
Cynical observers of the political scene lazily dismiss each unfolding Obama outrage as merely Washington politics as usual. But with this administration, we’re witnessing power grabs that are different in kind rather than degree.
Our liberties depend on our preserving the integrity of the Constitution and the mechanisms it established to deter tyranny. To the extent we dismantle those safeguards, we imperil our freedoms.
When the political class is filled with those who are ideologically committed to certain political ends irrespective of the legality of the means used to achieve them, our system of checks and balances breaks down, which is one reason John Adams warned, “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”
November’s elections cannot come fast enough.
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David Limbaugh is a writer, author and attorney. His new book, “Crimes Against Liberty,” will come out in August. To find out more about David Limbaugh, please visit his website at http://www.DavidLimbaugh.com.
SuperSparky's Land of Common Sense 
If the US Constitution clearly defines authority between state and federal levels, then a violation of that clear definition would be attackable – whether it was by the feds or by the states. If the Constitution’s definitions of what the feds CAN do and what the states can do are NOT clear in some issues, then the distinction must be adjudicated. Right? If it is true – and there is plenty of case law, history, argument and logic to support this view - that defending borders is the role of the federal government and not left to the whims, differences and politics of each state, then it would be a violation for one state to try to pre-empt the feds in that role. It would be like (wouldn’t it?) Arizona trying to declare war (that’s the job or Congress). Or like Arizona trying to legislate national policies on voting rights or trade policy (it is just not their turf). Or it would be like Arizona trying to decide for its citizens how federal laws are to be interpreted (that is the job of the Supreme Court). Would it be “states rights” for Arizona to decide by fiat that they can send troops to Iraq, or set tariffs on foreign trade with countries they don’t like? Should we encourage states like Arizona to conduct international diplomacy when they feel like it, or try to regulate interstate commerce? Law restricts both ways.Yes, the federal level does interfere and has interfered with states rights. On education, in particular, for example. However, the states are equally stupid and wrongheaded when they try to interfere with federal law that applies across all states.
I like the argument that we can’t have 50 different states with 50 different laws on this. That is so scary it isn’t funny. As far as I know there are a lot of laws on the books that are different state to state. We can’t have 50 different laws on what marriage is. Or one that I would like to see brought up. MA can’t outlaw nunchucks because we can’t have 50 different laws about what type of weapons you can or can’t have.
There is a flaw to your argument, though it is a very good one. You see, the Constitution does not give the Federal government the option to enforce the borders and protect the safety and sovereignty of the States. It is something the States mandate the Federal government do through the Constitution. The Constitution is a contract between the States that set up a Federal government SUBJECT TO the States. If the Federal Government refuses to do its mandated duty, according to the Constitution, then that government becomes null and void as it is violating the law, and TREATY between the States that is the Constitution.Far too many do not understand that the Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution are the first acts of Congress. Before the Constitution, there was no federal government. It was merely a comfortable agreement between 13 sovereign States. Read the preamble to the US Constitution. It states quite clearly the purpose of not only the Document itself, but the purpose of the Federal government the States were creating. The Federal government did not create the State governments. This key aspect must be understood.The US Constitution specifically limits the powers of the Federal Government and Specifically states that whatever power not mentioned in the document lies strictly with the States themselves.So, how does this apply to Arizona? Well, if the Federal Government refuses to do its Constitutionally mandated duty to protect Arizona from all enemies foreign and domestic, and refuses to prevent invasion, then the Federal government renders its authority null and void as the only thing that gives it its power is the very document with which they refuse to honor. It is a treaty as much as it is the highest law in the land. When a government breaks a treaty, knowingly and with malice (intent), then that treaty is rendered null and void to the others bound by it. Do you understand the ramifications of this?The first act of Congress, written into the Congressional record, and is just as much law as all others from Congress is the Declaration of Independence. Read what it says should be done when a government turns tyrannical. Yes, my friend, the Declaration is more than what modern education teaches you. It is law, the first law ever written by the United States of America.You see, no authority is given to the Federal government beyond what the Constitution says it;s duty is. It has no authority to give free health care. It has no authority to say it will not enforce immigration law. It has no choice. The law breaker here isn’t Arizona. It is the Federal Government and every person in it that swore and oath to UPHOLD and DEFEND the Constitution of the United States of America.Here’s my stake on the Arizona Law.If I was the judge (and not a liberal activist like this joker judge is) I’d look at it from the point of view of the US Constitution (like a Federal Judge is supposed to do). How? First determine if the Feds have upheld their Constitutional responsibility FIRST.Any and all claims by the Feds of saying “we don’t have enough personnel or funds” would immediately be held in contempt as they have unconstitutionally spent trillions on what they have no authority to spend on. Order those funds be first diverted to fulfilling the Federal Government’s duties at a satisfactory level, period.The Feds have no legal right to manage the economy, nor to regulate those participating in it. Their only authority is to make sure one State does not have an unfair advantage over the other.Good God, read the Constitution at least once. You’ll find the Feds have no authority to do 90% of what they are doing. In fact, the only branch of the Feds that should exist is the defense department, the commerce department, the CIA, and the Border Patrol. That’s it. Anything else is not Constitutional.Why do they exercise authority they don’t have? Why, we allow them to.
Actually, that’s exactly what the Constitution allows the States to do, to a point. One of the Constitutional duties of the Federal government was to make sure one State could not make a law that would negatively affect or burden another State. One State could not have tariffs on goods from another state. They couldn’t tax goods from one state, but not tax goods from their own or another friendly State. They had to apply things evenly to all States, as far as commerce was concerned. The Feds did NOT have authority to regulate States, nor did they have authority to seize land nor private property (national parks or reserves). Such things were left to the States to set up on their own.Marriage has always been a religious ordinance. Governments only became involved when they learned they could tax it. Having the government mandate what marriage is, is frankly unconstitutional, as they have no right to interfere with religious worship. Having the government declare that marriage is different than what the religious declare it is, is government setting up its own church and belief system. That is unconstitutional. The government can set up coupling agreements and contracts if it so wishes, but to declare to a religion what something that has always been a religious act; well, that’s illegal.So, there should not be any law governing marriage at all. Mind you, that actually goes contrary to what the homosexual community has been trying to do. They have been trying to force churches to conform by making marriage a governmental rule instead of a religious ordinance. This is unconstitutional. I am a supporter of California’s Prop 8 in its capacity to protect the separation of religion, which is why it was written.Each State has a Constitutional right to have its own laws that govern things within its borders. They are, after all, sovereign nations/States that have only delegated protection to a central body.Please read both the Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution. You may actually learn something. The age of these documents have nothing to do with the simple facts and restrictions they lay out to the Federal and State governments. They could just as easily been written today and be equally applicable.
Ok I understand the whole religious aspect of the marriage thing. What I do not agree with is giving advantages to people who have partaken in a religious act. What I mean is that there are tax breaks, lower insurance costs, and all sorts of advantages to being married. What the state governments need to do, is completely separate the religious aspect of marriage, from the financial aspect of marriage. If My best friend and I want to join our assets to save money, then we should be allowed to do it. We are not gay, and we are not attacking the religion. The gays are going about this the wrong way. I think when two people get married by the church, the government should still recognize the two of them as individuals. After the two are married, then they must go to the local government, and join their assets. This would be a entirely separate thing in the eyes of the government. Also, the two could live with one another for a couple of years to see if it is going to last. You could even enact a waiting period, before they join their assets. This would not be looked upon badly in the eyes of the church, because they are officially married to the church. To the government they are still two individuals.Lets face it marriage these days is not what it used to be. Most people are getting married to easily and divorced just as easily. With this separation, it would allow couples to see if they are going to last, before they join assets, and move to the next step. Once they decide they wish to go to the next step, they sign a contract. The contract allows them to be seen as one entity in the eyes of the government. At this point then they can receive all the benefits that married people receive today. Like I said before, anyone could join into one of these contracts in order to get these tax breaks and other such things. Also, the breaking of this contract must be a lot more difficult. In fact, breaking the contract must be so difficult that most would think twice before trying to go into one. Make it so that there are incredible fees for wasting the government’s court times and such. This would eliminate a lot of the court expenses and drama that happens right now. I agree with the religious people out there that marriage should stay within their own churches and such. I do not agree that they should be getting benefits from the state and local governments for being married. It is a religious ceremony, no one should get an advantage from being married by a church.Personally I just think that everyone needs to mind their own business. What I do in my room is none of your business. I honestly do not want to know what you do In yours. Gays you need to make this more about personal, and individual rights, instead of gay verses straight. Religious people need to stop acting as though you are in your own little club by being married. The argument should be…..“should people that partake in a religious act get an unfair advantage over everyone else?” separate the two and stop the argument.
Actually, the very things you speak of do exist. They are called “Corporations” and “LLC’s”. If you choose to make it an exclusively coupling agreement, then so be it. Nevertheless, combining one’s assets with your best friend for a tax break has been around for many many years. You form a corporation and have the corporation own the property. Make sure the “shares” of the corporation are divided 50/50 and congratulations, one nice and tidy tax shelter and lawsuit safe agreement.There is no “unfair advantage”. In fact, those that are married are often punished more than singles and those under cohabitation agreements.
The arguments offered by the homosexual lobby have no merit because everything they want (tax breaks, insurance breaks, etc.) are already covered under other legal contracts. The truth is the homosexual lobby wants to dictate doctrine to the churches. In other words, force them to accept homosexuality as an acceptable practice, and the best way to do so is one of the most holy ordinances of many religions, marriage. Again, there is nothing under the definition of marriage under any State law that is not already covered under contract law already, AND you don’t need a judge nor preacher to make it legal. As to wasting the court’s time with divorce etc. I agree, however, the “waiting period” used to be there. It was called “courtship” and was essentially done away with during the so-called “sexual revolution”. The religious society had strict rules and traditions to follow to make the understanding of the marriage ordinance very important. Divorce, while being around for millennia, was always considered a taboo or fringe practice. Society shunned it and considered it a cowardly process. This was when the world considered honor, duty, and keeping a promise much more important than words like today. If you had problems with your spouse, you worked it out with them and perhaps the minister. It was always none of the government’s business. You made a promise to them and God, for better or worse. It was your honor and their honor at stake if you did not succeed. Exceptions were adultery.
If you want to correct the problems with marriage and divorce, it is better looking for the attitudes that cause them in the first place and correct them first. The government, according to this nation’s founding documents and it’s many founding fathers, was to keep its nose out of the affairs of the individual and couples. Hence the phrase, “Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness”. An interfering government was an abomination to liberty. Frankly, I support a more rigorous method contrary to yours. Give couples the option of a mere contract. However, if marriage is chosen, then they are stuck that way. The law used to be that way, and the adulterer usually got nothing. In many cases divorce was denied because of a lack of adultery. You see, much of what you wished for used to be there, but the lax attitude of modern society has made marriage end up being the joke it thinks it is today. How about both parties get nothing at divorce and the fortune is put into a trust for their children? No more sugar-daddies/mommas. You either mean it and marry or find something else to do. Perhaps those divorcing would think less of themselves and more about the children who’s life they are damaging if they both lost everything at divorce.
I see what you are saying and agree. yes I agree the gays are just trying to stick their noses into the church’s business. that is why they should just keep the two apart, and avoid all of this. lets just make a law that says “states are not to recognize any sort of religious ceremonie.” That way everyone would have to form an LLC or Corp. Get rid of the reasons to complain. Also, I agree about the children as well. the parties involved need to be more accountable to the children instead of using them as pawns to get thier way.
There already is a law stating the government cannot interfere with religion at all. In fact, it is in the Constitution as part of the first amendment to that document (emphasis added):
It’s right there. Yet you see government doing just the opposite every day. The whole point of the homosexual lobby is to declare Marriage a “right”. It’s not a right it is a religious ordinance, a privilege. This would give lawyers a means to sue churches that refused to perform a marriage that isn’t according to their doctrine. The point being not a right to marry, but a means to punish churches for not “conforming” to the homosexual playbook. People have a right to live how they see fit, according to a lifestyle they choose, but they have no right to force it on others. The homosexual lobby constantly tries to do just that, force their lifestyle choice on others and demand acceptance. Choices have consequences.