Neighborhood Ministries

We are seeing courts that are way out of their jurisdiction. Courts are to mitigate disputes and enforce laws, however courts are taking upon themselves to try to run the government. We saw it before  when a district court claimed it had jurisdiction to  halt acts of the President. The Constitution only authorizes one court to have jurisdiction over the President and that is the Supreme Court. District courts are restricted to their district and cannot make rulings that apply nationwide. Other district courts may cite their rulings in cases applying to their district but are not compelled to. The Supreme Court reprimanded the district courts for exceeding their authority but it has not stopped them from trying. Now a district court has ordered the President to pay SNAP benefits during the government shutdown. First of all, the President is a higher authority then the  District court and doesn’t have to take orders from District courts and second, the courts can’t just tell him to pay the benefits without legislative approval. The courts cannot authorize government expenditures. That is reserved for Congress.  President Trump worked out with the Dept of Agriculture to pay the October benefits from their emergency fund and secured private donations to pay partial benefits during November in the hope that the Democrats will end their childish refusal to approve the budget until they get the added funds they want. The President can’t just authorize expenditures without Congressional authorization though President Biden did it openly in clear violation of the Constitution which is why we are in the financial mess we are in. The courts have no authority to force the President to solicit private funds to pay the governments bills until the Democrats give in. The  benefits have to be authorized by Congress and there is no authorization until Congress approves the budget or an emergency authorization. Republicans have  floated bills to pay the armed services, the federal employees, the air traffic controllers, SNAP recipients and others until they can get the budget passed but Democrats have refused  to approve them because it would weaken the leverage they have to blackmail the Republicans into approving  vast new expenditures.

We are seeing a rash of liberal district judges who are issuing injunctions to block President Trump’s executive actions and liberal judges around the country are treating it as legally binding on their jurisdictions. Nowhere in the Constitution does it give district federal judges authority over the whole country. District judges are over federal districts and do not have authority beyond their districts. They also do not have authority over the President of the United States. Their job is to rule on disputes between States and concerns that transcend State boundaries within their jurisdiction. The Constitution gives only two entities power over the President. Congress may enact laws overriding the President’s actions or the Supreme Court can rule the actions unconstitutional. Unfortunately, the Supreme Court in its recent decision allowed that the President had a right to take the action he did but decided not to rule on whether district judges could block the President for some reason leaving a legal mess which allows liberal district judges to continue to harass the President and block his actions.

There are many State and local judges and politicians who continue to ignore the Constitution and Supreme court rulings, imposing their views on the American people. While the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the right of the Kentucky man who makes T-shirts, to refuse to print shirts for the local Gay pride festival, officials in the State of Kentucky continue to harass and threaten him. If the governor appointed those involved, he should fire them. If he does not, he is guilty of dereliction of duty and the people should not reelect him or if he isn’t up for reelection, they should circulate petitions to remove him. If the people elect the judges as they do in some States, the voters should vote him out. The people need to elect judges that will obey the law and monitor them to see that they do. If they don’t, replace them with judges who will. We are a republic based on the rule of law, not a dictatorship of the judiciary. Our officials need to be held accountable for their actions and the actions of those they appoint or we will continue to suffer such injustice and it will spread. Many public officials currently ignore or overturn votes of the people and if the people don’t exercise their right to vote now, the officials will abolish elections and then the people will no longer have a voice. People tell me that will never happen but a few years ago when the Supreme Court held a liberal majority, the Justices in a footnote to their majority opinion on State marriage laws stated that votes of the people are merely advisory and not binding on public officials, an opinion clearly violating the Constitution, but which many politicians subscribe to. Therefore it is all the more important that you to vote in officials that will respect the laws for city, county, and State, as well as federal offices, and vote out those that don’t.

While we now have a President that supports the Constitution and the rule of law, and we now have a majority of Supreme Court Justices who support the Constitution and the rule of law, it is a shaky victory. Democrats stated that if they were able to get a majority in Congress, they would impeach the President and Justice Kavanaugh, though they have no evidence of crimes committed by either. They tried twice by approving articles of impeachment against President Trump even though they could find no evidence of wrong-doing and their investigation exposed the fact that the charges against President Trump of colluding with the Russians was a fabricated lie by Hilliary Clinton to discredit President Trump and remove him from office and charges of inciting a riot on January 6 were false. He tried to stop it and Democrats blocked his attempts to protect the capital building. Fortunately Republicans had the votes to block it in the Senate both times. We may not be so fortunate next time. While liberal politicians claim that President Trump is undermining the rule of law, we are seeing a very determined effort by liberal politicians to subvert the political process by openly violating the law.

It is interesting to hear those who are screaming because President Trump is sending illegal immigrants involved in criminal activities home and sending students involved in violent anti-American riots home portraying them as innocent freedom seekers. They have been very soft on crime. When President Obama and President Biden were in office, they pushed for reducing police forces making it more difficult to stop criminals and outlawed guns in areas they control to disarm innocent citizens and give criminals free reign since criminals don’t obey gun laws. They reduced penalties for crimes and often don’t prosecute criminals, resulting in increased shoplifting, theft, and murders in areas they control. They encouraged the rioters in major cities attacking the police, burning businesses, and killing people and the people vandalizing and burning churches and crisis pregnancy centers and did nothing to bring them to justice. On the other hand, they arrested and prosecuted innocent people whose only crime was praying in front of an abortion clinic. No property was damaged and no one was killed or injured yet they sentenced them to 11 years in prison and treated them shamefully in prison. It seems they only want mercy for the criminals and those who support their policies and they use the courts to threaten and intimidate innocent people who oppose their policies.