Setting a New Standard ~ 03/11/03

Come this July, our experiment in freedom will be 227 years old. Our Constitution will celebrate its 213th birthday this June. During those long and glorious 213 years we have had 43 Presidents. In those 200 plus years we have had two Presidents Impeached (Andrew Johnson & William Clinton), neither of which was removed from office. We have had one President (Richard Nixon), and one Vice President (Spiro Agnew) resign in disgrace.These 43 men have nominated hundreds of Supreme Court judges and thousands of federal judges. These Judges, like the men who nominated them, were on the average honest hard working Americans, trying to make our nation a better place to live. Every single one of those Judges went thru the Constitutionally required Senate approval system. We have had Judicial Nominees approved and disapproved during the long history of our nation, using the Constitutionally approved method.

Over the last few years, we have seen congress pass laws that have severely limited, and in some cases, revoked our Constitutional rights. The first Amendment guarantee of Freedom of Speech was REVOKED by the Finance Reform Act, Our Second Amendment right to bear arms has been severely restricted by hundreds of laws passed, Our 4th Amendment protection from Random Search and Seizure was ignored in the rush to pass the Patriot Act of 2002. Now we find the body of the Constitution itself under attack. The Constitution requires that to get Senate approval for a Judicial Appointment the Judge only needs a simple majority, 51 votes. In the long history of our nation NO Judicial Appointee has every been the victim of a Senate Filabuster. During the dark days leading up to the Civil War, None of the Judicial Appointees were Filabustered. Despite the many regional and political crises that our nation has struggled through in 213 years, the Senate has never Filabustered a Judicial Nominee Until NOW. The Democrats, led by Senator Daschal who spent all of 2001 & 2002 blocking votes of Judicial nominees, have now chosen to Filabuster the appointment of the first Hispanic Judge to the Federal Appeals Court. In affect, this means for a Judge to get Senate approval he needs 60 votes instead of the Constitutionally mandated 51.

How long are any of our Constitutionally protected and God Given rights "SAFE" when the Congress of the United States of America simply ignores the Constitution for purely partisan political reasons?

God Bless America
Bill Hocutt