THE EVOLUTION OF JUDICIAL TYRANNY IN THE UNITED STATES:

"If the judges interpret the laws themselves, and suffer none else to interpret, they may easily make, of the laws, [a shredded] shipman's hose!" - King James I of England, around 1616.

“No class of the community ought to be allowed freer scope in the expression or publication of opinions as to the capacity, impartiality or integrity of judges than members of the bar. They have the best opportunities of observing and forming a correct judgment. They are in constant attendance on the courts. Hundreds of those who are called on to vote never enter a court-house, or if they do, it is only at intervals as jurors, witnesses or parties. To say that an attorney can only act or speak on this subject under liability to be called to account and to be deprived of his profession and livelihood by the very judge or judges whom he may consider it his duty to attack and expose, is a position too monstrous to be entertained for a moment under our present system,” Justice Sharwood in Ex Parte Steinman and Hensel, 95 Pa 220, 238-39 (1880).

“This case illustrates to me the serious consequences to the Bar itself of not affording the full protections of the First Amendment to its applicants for admission. For this record shows that [the rejected attorney candidate] has many of the qualities that are needed in the American Bar. It shows not only that [the rejected attorney candidate] has followed a high moral, ethical and patriotic course in all of the activities of his life, but also that he combines these more common virtues with the uncommon virtue of courage to stand by his principles at any cost.

It is such men as these who have most greatly honored the profession of the law. The legal profession will lose much of its nobility and its glory if it is not constantly replenished with lawyers like these. To force the Bar to become a group of thoroughly orthodox, time-serving, government-fearing individuals is to humiliate and degrade it.” In Re Anastaplo, 18 Ill. 2d 182, 163 N.E.2d 429 (1959), cert. granted, 362 U.S. 968 (1960), affirmed over strong dissent, 366 U.S. 82 (1961), Justice Black, Chief Justice Douglas and Justice Brennan, dissenting.

" I do not believe that the practice of law is a "privilege" which empowers Government to deny lawyers their constitutional rights. The mere fact that a lawyer has important responsibilities in society does not require or even permit the State to deprive him of those protections of freedom set out in the Bill of Rights for the precise purpose of insuring the independence of the individual against the Government and those acting for the Government”. Lathrop v Donohue, 367 US 820 (1961), Justice Black, dissenting.

"The legal profession must take great care not to emulate the many occupational groups that have managed to convert licensure from a sharp weapon of public defense into blunt instrument of self-enrichment". Walter Gellhorn, "The Abuse of Occupational Licensing", University of Chicago Law Review, Volume 44 Issue 1, September of 1976.

“Because the law requires that judges no matter how corrupt, who do not act in the clear absence of jurisdiction while performing a judicial act, are immune from suit, former Judge Ciavarella will escape liability for the vast majority of his conduct in this action. This is, to be sure, against the popular will, but it is the very oath which he is alleged to have so indecently, cavalierly, baselessly and willfully violated for personal gain that requires this Court to find him immune from suit”, District Judge A. Richard Caputo in H.T., et al, v. Ciavarella, Jr, et al, Case No. 3:09-cv-00286-ARC in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, Document 336, page 18, November 20, 2009. This is about judges who were sentencing kids to juvenile detention for kickbacks.


Wednesday, October 8, 2014

Is licensing an executive or a judicial function? It is like a chameleon, it changes colors to match whoever performs it.

Licensing is normally an executive function.


Yet, it is claimed to be judicial function in attorney licensing because the Legislature delegated this executive power to courts.


I claimed that the Legislature did not have the power to delegate what it did not have (the executive power) to courts - but the claim was rejected by federal court under the Younger abstention, thus dumping it to state court, and the state court rejected the same claim without any explanation.


Recently, a federal district court applied absolute judicial immunity to a pistol licensing officer because he is a judge in the particular county in the State of New York out of which the case originated, even though in other counties of the State of New York the very same pistol licensing is handled by police officers who are not judges and are not attorneys.


The judiciary covered itself by the absolute judicial immunity, even for malicious and corrupt acts, without regard that such an immunity from constitutional violations (violations of oath of office) is not and may not be authorized by the U.S. Constitution.


Yet, the judiciary pretended that the rule of absolute judicial immunity is not absolutely arbitrary and has its limitations, that it applies only to "judicial acts" of a judge acting within jurisdiction of the court.


At the same time, courts routinely continuing to expand judicial immunity long beyond its breaking point.


As an example, judges disqualified by conflicts of interest, bias and financial interests are still immune (in federal courts' eyes).


And, as the Judiciary Law 90 and the recent decision by the Northern District of New York on the 2nd Amendment shows, when a certain administrative function is performed by a judge, it is assumed that the function has changed its nature from executive to judicial, and all of that to keep judges absolutely immune from liability, no matter what they do, to preserve absolute power in the judiciary and to preserve judiciary's ability to wreak absolute fear in such power.


Whatever you call such a government, it may not be called a democracy.

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