Topic: Justice
American Statement of Grievance on Government & Judiciary (Part 4 of 4) Thomas Jefferson Could See the Futureby Gary Trieste
(libertarian)
Friday, July 24, 2009
Summons to our Leaders and the Judiciary for Review of Defects and Amelioration
In light of the above, we of the judicially aggrieved class, and the People of the United States of America, do hereby indict the judiciary as responsible for all of the above defects and infirmities incumbent in our legal system. It is they who have let it go astray, and who are always in the position to reform it instantly.
We assert that this condition is a cancer upon us and distinctly unAmerican in its state.
All we as a people ask and seek from our judiciary, the most important branch of our unique form of government, is adherence to the principles and implementation of due process and respect for the precepts of the U.S. Constitution.
We would be satisfied with judges and courts that are simply professional, unbiased, neutral, attentive and even dispassionate/ indifferent to the cases and litigants before them.
We want the triers of law (and often times of the facts) to adhere simply and formally to the written rule of law, showing no favoritism for particular litigants or causes or social platforms, and bereft of the tendency to reinterpret or expand the law into something other than what is exactly written.
Conversely we want the judiciary to not shy away from the liberal application of its legislation-invalidation powers, i.e., the striking down of laws and statutes that either [1] do not comport with the bald edicts of the U.S. Constitution, [2] are prima facially ambiguous or incomplete, or [3] are logically inconsistent with their own construction or with that of other existent laws.
Our hope and expectation is that with such proper policing, a message would be sent to our lawmakers that the end product of their legislative process should be released only after proper investigation, conference, public comment and consideration, and a true weighing of the pros and cons of the ramifications the subject law would have, and thus would regain the level of conciseness, integrity and true form that has been sorely lacking in the past few decades. Instead of laws designed more for the acronyms they moniker (e.g., USA PATRIOT ACT, RICO), the Legislative should be concerned with the viability and cohesive substantive content of the laws they produce.
As it appears that the judiciary has failed to police itself along these lines and in the administration of the laws (an inevitability when there is no higher authority in the land), and that it appears to be careering toward a system of both slovenly form and stricture, combined with an extreme statist mentality, we hereby submit for and demand the following reforms to be effected:
1. Absolute time limits on pending decision issuances.
2. An absolute requirement that all decisions must be justified with an itemized list of factual and legal findings supporting the subject decision and order; no empty summary orders, boiler plate re-enunciation of statutes, or memorandumless orders.
3. Require and set up pro se liaisons for each court, with the authority to guide and direct pro se litigants in the technical details of presenting their cases to the court.19
4. Requirement that the courts follow the subject case controlling laws as they are written, with no hyperbole or expanded interpretation.20
5. Requirement that the courts mandatorily adhere to their own written laws of court procedure (e.g. Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, Bankruptcy Procedure, etc.) These procedural laws should be just as binding on judges as any law is binding upon the rest of us.
6. Facilitate and encourage the judicial invalidation and condemnation of laws and statutes that are not well-formed, either due to ambiguous construct, inconsistency, or because they violate the mandates and guarantees of the U.S. Constitution.
7. Establish citizen review committees for judges and all other officers of the court. Such review boards should have authority to receive and review any and all complaints made against judges, make an unbiased determination as to whether the subject judge broke procedural or substantive law, and to issue condemnation or exoneration of the complaint, and the power to effect punitive measures. The members of the committee should be completely independent of the judiciary and immune to any pressures therefrom or from other political powers. Furthermore such reviews should be entirely public from start to finish, so that any such complaints, claims, discussions, proceedings and resolutions would be available for public purview; there is a public trust vested in these judicial officers, and if that trust is put into question, then that question, review, and resolution should be made public as well.
8. Review, question and repeal absolute immunity laws, so that no one can evade personal liability when they have broken the law.
9. As a symbolic measure against even the appearance of conflict of interests, judges' paychecks should not be issued by the U.S. Justice Department.
10. Provide for and institute some meaningful, routine and standardized sanction procedure for wayward judges, judges who regularly breach the rules of procedure, or refuse to apply the law as written. Such sanction may take on the form of anything from public rebuke to reduction of pay, to relegation of their duties to non-trial tasks.
Conclusion
All we are seeking is the process due as guaranteed by equity and the Constitution.
We are not looking for favors, preferential treatment or bias, just the neutrality, and unembellished attentiveness from our judges that the ideals of the Constitution and adherence to rules of written law demand. We seek return to a state in preserving the ideals our Founding Fathers originally realized, and reified during the conception of our nation.
On the face of it, the set of laws and procedural rules that govern us as written, by and large, form a comprehensive, just and practical template for jurisprudence; in the implementation of them they have been perverted beyond recognition.21
Unfortunately, the judiciary is no longer bound to any fixed touchstone or brightline rules, and has strayed far in the interpretation of the laws from what the laws actually are. Compounding their own sins, the judiciary has permitted the legislature to run willy nilly in the issuances of what is considered legally acceptable and well-formed law.
It is for these reasons we, as representatives of the People, combine and compact together to petition for grievance on these matters.
It is for these reasons that we demand forthwith a meaningful and effective reform of the judiciary, as fully detailed above.
We seek a reform that includes an interactive public forum and tribunal to review all complaints and proceedings against members of the judiciary and other officers of the court, with enforcement capabilities to sanction violations of procedure and law. Such forum must have the power to keep in check instances of judicial excess, as it appears that no system unmoored can effectively police itself. (Absolute power permits corruption absolutely)
We assert that upon such reforms and continuing public review, the judiciary will once again rightly take reign as the shining example to the free world, in its purity of process and loyalty to the Constitution, so that it may carry out its obligations, responsibilities and service to the People.
"A departure from principle in one instance becomes a precedent for a second; that second for a third; and so on, till the bulk of the society is reduced to be mere automatons of misery..." -Thomas Jefferson, 1816
[Note: While this series concerned the jurisprudential application of Civil Law, the following issues omitted thereabove are equally important, and relate to the travesty and pathological mutation of the application of criminal law. These are so much the more helacious insofar that the lives and personal freedoms of citizens are sacrificed in breach of supposedly inviolable Constitutional guarantees, in exchange for the expedited processing of those accused.
Unattainable standards for proving ineffective assistance of counsel (IAC).
Unconstitutional standards of evidentiary proof in federal prosecutions, e.g., convictions permitted based upon the sole uncorroborated testimony of a cooperating witness who is being paid for his testimony or being forgiven for his own crimes for said testimony.
The false federal jurisdiction over intrastate Conspiracy crimes/acts, and other purely intrastate activities.
Unconstitutional delegation of criminal law and/or punishment of legislative powers to the Administrative/Executive Agencies (e.g, controlled substance assignments, illegalization/scheduling, and criminal penalties enacted by the DEA).
The Abolition of Private Property in America.
The waning practice and concept of innocence before being proven guilty, and the ever-multiplying categories of "innocence" of which courts are making distinctions (e.g. factual innocence, actual innocence, legal innocence, civil guilt vs. criminal guilt, pretrial innocence rights conditioned upon state of detention/incarceration (e.g. access to courts/legal reference, punishment via detention, impediments to forming/actualizing defense, in forma pauperis rights and court filing requirements). [This last item refers to pretrial detained defendants who are heavily prejudiced against in their Constitutional rights, and that are treated in every practical sense as convicted persons].
Habeas Corpus inequities, and standards of review.
Reconciliation of criminal defendant's rights with what is demanded by the Constitution (e.g., punitive vs. administrative detention, search warrant standards, coercion to waive trial, penalty for refusing to self-incriminate or affirmatively defending at trial, derivative/enhancement criminal charges, court substituted findings of required jury findings, etc.)
Juries should be informed of the applicable law as well as the penalties.
Never ending penalties, even after service of sentence (e.g. civil confinement after sentence completion, alien detainees).
The need for test/sting cases to be put through the criminal court system to inspect the legitimacy of a given criminal forum, to maintain quality control, and give notice to the court(s) that the case before them may very well be a test to see how well they are performing and adhering to the law.
The requirement for the same standards of proof to be imposed for introduced evidences developed from circumstances prior to arrest, i.e. require all law enforcement agents to record the facts justifying or leading up to an arrest before being admissible as probable cause.
Footnotes:
19.But not to provide legal research or give legal advice going to the substance or the tactical strategy of their cases. Just a court representative who could answer direct questions about how the court expects the presentation of the case elements and procedure.
20.Presuming it passes the aforementioned tests for ambiguity, consistency and Constitutional muster.
21.We are reminded of the Soviet Russian Constitution, an admirable document full of guaranteed rights and citizenry empowerments, but one completely unfollowed and ignored by the Russian judiciary and Politburo.
The views expressed in this
article are those of Gary Trieste only and do not represent
the views of Nolan Chart, LLC or its affiliates. Gary Trieste is
solely responsible for the contents of this article and is not an
employee or otherwise affiliated with Nolan Chart, LLC in his/her role as a columnist.
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Summons to our Leaders and the Judiciary for Review of Defects and Amelioration