Connecticut Commentary: Red Notes from a Blue State

Mandates in the health care law promulgated and supported by President Barack Obama’s administration already have produced some related push back from the United States Supreme Court. If the matter of health care mandates reaches the high court, it will be heard by justices who have already overwhelmingly affirmed that the First Amendment provides exceptions to religious employers. In a recent case involving the right of a Lutheran school to fire an employee, Chief Justice John Roberts, writing for the majority, declared that the U.S. Constitution does not permit “government interference with an internal church decision that affects the faith and mission of the church itself,” a ruling that legal scholars regard as the court’s most significant declaration on religious freedom in two decades. The unanimous 9-0 decision represented a dramatic defeat for the Obama administration, which argued in the case that in firing a teacher the school was not exempt from civil rights claims. In...

The new policy in place deprives religious groups on campus of effectuating their mission because the policy removes standards of leadership, according to Chris Godfrey, the National Advisor of Beta Upsilon Chi, Inc. Mr. Godfrey has sent out the following media release: “Dear News Team, “I would like to inform you about a situation at Vanderbilt University that has escalated over the past few weeks and would like to encourage you to get the word out about this story. The Chancellor at the university, Nicholas Zeppos, sent out an e-mail two weeks ago informing the student body about a new non-discrimination policy that will that undermine the integrity of many student religious organizations. This issue deals with our First Constitutional Right, Freedom of Religion, Press, and Expression. “He says in his e-mail that ‘I want to assure you the university does not seek to limit anyone's freedom to practice his or her religion. We do, however, require all Vanderbilt registere...

I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male (as a jurist) who hasn’t lived that life -- Judge Sonia Sotomayor, 2001 Some decisions she’s made do raise questions about whether she will decide cases based on the law or her personal outlook and feelings and preconceived notions. We will want to examine that carefully, to make sure she will decide cases based on the law, not on how she feels about them -- Senator Jon Kyl President Obama agrees with Judge Sotomayor’s judicial philosophy. He disagrees with Senator Kyl. He believes personal experience is a way of understanding what the world is like. He has criticized the Warren Supreme Court because it failed to do things for the disadvantaged like redistributing income. He believes the Supreme Court should be doing things for people and not just safeguarding them from negative things. There are disadvantaged classes, and the...

The Republican mythology of the upcoming presidential election has put Fred Thompson center stage as the sole true conservative candidate; Rudy Giuliani , John McCain and George Romney are moderate Republicans. Thompson’s withdrawal therefore represents a setback for conservatives. The dirges are only just now beginning. When Bill Buckley, running for mayor of New York, was asked what he would do if he actually won, he responded that he would string a net around one of the floors of the New York Times building. Nets are being strung, and the left in the United States may now safely expel its held breath: There will be no conservative candidate for president this year. Not everyone on the right is down in the dumps. Political commentator and classicist David Hanson, author of “A War Like No Other,” an account of the Peloponnesian War, has written favorably about McCain , producing cat calls from his usual cheering section. McCain, Hanson says, is no Ronald Reagan. But he reasonably poi...

The few sentences that follow below were selected almost at random from a commentary on Judge John Roberts, whose nomination to the U S Supreme Court, we are told by the commentator, “has reignited the controversy over faith and the confirmation process… From everything that has been reported so far, Roberts looks eminently qualified for the high court. His record paints a picture of a temperamentally moderate jurist who would be very unlikely to challenge precedent in the name of ideology, or to use his public position to advance his personal values. But what if there was a nominee who showed less restraint? Would that candidate's beliefs still be out of bounds for questioning as long as they were religious in nature?” Now, the first thing we should notice in this commentary is the author’s use of the devil word “ideology. Is religion an ideology? If it is an ideology, and if it is the only ideology not to be permitted to inform the decisions of Supreme Court justices, have we not...