A Message from a Constitutionally Literate Iowan
Some 234 years ago a brave group of visionaries from 13 American Colonies risked their livelihoods, their property, their treasure, their lives and the lives of their families to come against injustice and tyranny. They framed a Constitution for this new country that would attempt to limit the power and scope of it’s government and limit the legislative power of that government to that as expressed by the will of “the people”. I believe those framers would be appalled by the attempts of the branch of government that they most feared, the judiciary, to legislate and execute law as has been shown in the case of Varnum v. Brien.
The Iowa Supreme Court did their job by rendering their OPINION as to the constitutionality of The Defense of Marriage Act, a law passed by the Iowa legislature and legally signed into law by the governor. That is where their job ended! After nullification of The Defense of Marriage Act by the Supreme Court, prior law would take effect. Prior law did not state that homosexuals could marry each other. In order for there to be a law allowing homosexual marriage, both houses of the legislature (the representatives of “the people”) need to pass a bill legalizing homosexual marriage and the governor needs to sign that bill into law.
Many people have mistakenly drawn the conclusion that the only reason for the effort to remove the three Iowa Supreme Court justices is because they don’t hold the same opinion of homosexual marriage. The more important issue for many is that the courts are increasingly acting outside of their legal authority as given to them by “the people’.
The reason that there is a judicial retention vote of the people is so that there is recourse by “the people” to deal with judges that are unfit or act outside of their constitutional authority as granted by the will of “the people”. After expressing their OPINION of the Defense of Marriage Act, the Supreme Court went beyond their constitutional authority and declared that homosexual marriage is now “the law” and they tried to order all county recorders that they must follow this new law or risk losing their jobs.
Beyond rendering their OPINION as to constitutionality of The Defense of Marriage Act, The Iowa Supreme Court’s attempt to create a new law and execute that phony law into the code is not authorized by our constitution and is therefore illegal!
Article 1, sec. 2 of the Iowa Constitution states: “All political power is inherent in the people. Government is instituted for the protection, security, and benefit of the people, and they have the right, at all times, to alter or reform the same, whenever the public good may require it.” The judicial retention vote is one way that we exercise our control of the judicial branch when it has unjustly exercised power not granted by our constitution. The definition of tyranny is “absolute power arbitrarily or unjustly exercised”. Unaccountable judges declaring law and attempting to exercise that law without authorization to do so by our constitution is TYRANNY !!! I believe our founders would have resisted this attempt by the supreme court every bit as much as they resisted the tyranny of King George III.
At times “the people” have to remind our government who is really in charge! Please join those of us concerned about this judicial abuse of power in voting “NO” to retain the three justices of the Iowa Supreme Court. They have arrogantly shown that they have forgotten whom they serve.
Thank You, Steve Fisher, Grand Junction, Iowa
