Imposing political will outside of the democratic process

[George Jung]

Perhaps not the best title, but what the heck.

NYTimes has an article on this, and a 'search' of topic shows it's been discussed often, of late, though I hadn't crossed it before. There's a 'shortage' of the drugs used for lethal injection, and the prisons mandated to carry out these executions have resorted to alternative drugs, and sources, to meet their needs. The anti-execution group has pressured manufacturers of these drugs to cease and desist, and many have. Now that some states have found ways to skirt these efforts, the 'antis' are going to court to attempt to block these efforts.

My take - putting aside my personal views on executions - is that there seems a large percent of the populace unwilling to live by democratically determined laws. This is one example; another is the refusal of law enforcement in many cities to enforce the illegal alien laws, in the 'sanctuary cities'.

Regardless of whether you agree with these folks, what's your take on this disregard for duly determined law?

[Ian McColgin]

Re: Imposing political will outside of the democratic process

I am profoundly against the death penalty, but I agree that there is a lot of refusal to accept the democratic process around. It's more obvious in things like last session's forcing a super-majority on almost everything, this session's refusal to compromise most of the time, the resurgance of that idiocy we call nullification which last time it came to a major head gave us our Civil War, and the explosion of harrassment recall campaigns run with PAID signature gatherers for some hundreds of mayors and city counselors around the nation.

I am not convinced that consumer and citizen pressure on companies that make drugs which have but one use - "humane" state killing - fits in that non-democratic mode. I've always taken it that voting is the very minimum of civic duty anyway. How, for example, is pressure to stop making an execution drug all that different from pressure on a company like Nestle to stop marketing programs that sell infant formula in ways that prevent third world women from even starting nursing. Actually, since that boycott hasn't done much that I can see, maybe the states that want to kill bad guys should contract with a tough outfit like Nestle to make their drugs.

In celebration of Fort Summer, I've been trying to define where various sorts of activism cross the line from a vigorous minority making itself heard or what seems like a minority building support to becoming instead an embittered minority with a negative agenda and a demand for instant gratification bent on destroying the very notion of democratic self-government.

It's not 100% obvious black and white. Like most of life's questions that involve values in conflict in the real world, it's a problem.

[Phillip Allen]

Re: Imposing political will outside of the democratic process

These are good examples, but you missed the most obvious one: despite abortion being constitutionally deemed to be a right, local and state authorities, as well as Congressional action, has done a great deal to throw roadblocks in the way of people who want to excercise that constitutional right.

There's precedent for this. For example, district attornies have always excercised the right of 'judgment', i.e., the decision as to where to put their law enforcement assets when it comes to prosecuting a case. Nominally, those decisions are supposed to be practical.... for example, in a case where a hung jury calls for a decision as to whether to retry a case, or just let it go. Unfortunately, this level of discretion (a necessary one, I believe) has been abused from time to time, on political grounds; a favored politician, caught in a possible trap of malfeasance, gets a pass from a sympathetic attorney general.

constitutional right?

[Phillip Allen]

Re: Imposing political will outside of the democratic process

Try Roe V. Wade. I'm sure you can google up the Supreme Court decision.

does that address ABORTION or is abortion secondary?...I'm not against abortion so much as I'm against MEN getting involved...I don't think we (men) have a dog in the fight

I think you used the word "constitutional" to borrow power that is not yours to borrow...stay honest

[Phillip Allen]

Re: Imposing political will outside of the democratic process

It's called the Supreme Court, and it was established by the Founding Fathers to be the arbiter of the meaning of the Constitution. The constitution says nowhere, for example, that gun ownership is an individual right... it took a Supreme Court decision to make it so. The constitution says nothing about abortion.. but the Supreme Court interpreted the constitution that way.

You can't pick and choose decisions you like, vs. ones you don't. At least, not under the guise of trying to determine law. You always have the right to your opinions... just not to your own facts.

wrong again, "semantics-breath"...the supreme court confirmed what was already there and did not/has not the power to legislate...back to class with you

[David G]

Re: Imposing political will outside of the democratic process

Throughout history there have been examples of perverse refusal to live by the letter of the law... and refusals to honor the intent of a law. The rocky history of Civil Rights law enforcement might be an example. There have also been examples of humane and reasonable sidestepping, or ignoring, of a law that was on the books. In the same vein (slavery, and its aftermath)... who among us would want to prosecute the technically illegal acts of the Quakers in setting up and operating the Underground Railway? How'd you like to be arrested for allowing your pigeons to fly over Bellvue, Kentucky? Or for kicking the head off a rattlesnake in K'Falls, Oregon?

[Ian McColgin]

Re: Imposing political will outside of the democratic process

If we simply toss guns and fetuses at each other, we'll forget the actual topic. With very deeply held values, we must expect that even settled law will not be settled forever. Profound change like abolishing slavery and having a theoretically universal (though so largly unused) franchise are incredibly moving examples.

Guns and abortion rights are similar in one fundamental way - each has one side that is absolutist and one side that is relativist.

Outside of a few extreemists, there is no move for abolition of private gun ownership but the gun lobby views any move towards any level of responsible regulation as a threat.

Absolutely no one wants unrestricted unregulation abortion and EVERY pro-choise outfit puts more energy more successfully into preventing abortion than the anti-abortionists do, but the anti-choise extreemists want to end funding PAP tests, contraceptives and other women's reproductive services in their quest to end abortion by simple coersion rather than reduce abortions by better alternatives.

But in the end, these are very deep values that are not going away and neither side will win it's way forever. I don't see it as subverting our democracy to struggle for either side of either cause in a democratic full citizen participation manner.

[Phillip Allen]

Re: Imposing political will outside of the democratic process

"Outside of a few extreemists, there is no move for abolition of private gun ownership but the gun lobby views any move towards any level of responsible regulation as a threat."
I have an issue with this sentence...who died and made you deputy-god in charge of what is "responsible"?

the word "responsible" is thrown around over and over when we already have and have had responsible regulation for decades...you speak to the ignorant when you suggest that regulation already on the books is irresponsible (by extension) when you say we need "responsible" regulation when it already exists...a blatant attempt to stampede the ignorant (useful idiots) into abusing what is already on the books....this is as dishonest as it gets!

you also make a statement that those who don't "see" it your way are to be dismissed as extremists... dishonest, dishonest, dishonest!

[Phillip Allen]

Re: Imposing political will outside of the democratic process

Not a part of the Constitution, unlike gun rights.

didn't the rvw hinge on the 4th? (privacy)

[Ian McColgin]

Re: Imposing political will outside of the democratic process

Phillip, one wishes that you and other gun owners could understand a gesture of compromise. "Reasonable" is a matter of debate, inevitably, but there are already laws that have passed constitutional muster that limit the types of firearms one may even have or use for certain purposes. That's partly why we don't have those eight foot long cannon sized shotguns for bringing down a few hundred ducks at a blast. Or 50 cal machine guns for arial hunting of deer. Unfortunatly, there will be no debate if one side simply cleves to the position that there is no such thing as a legitimate or acceptable law defining and governing gun use and ownership.

[George Jung]

Re: Imposing political will outside of the democratic process

Maybe those combatants guilty of hijacking this thread would be so kind as to start their own (abortion) thread? Sheesh! And I see nothing about this topic that should ignite the usual hyperbole of the tinderbox titles.

Variations on these drugs are used in medicine/anesthesia; no doubt there are any number of other drugs that could be substituted - but it's my perception (could be wrong) that prisons find it difficult to get 'medical cooperation' in this department; it also appears that any given protocol must be reviewed/endorsed before it can be implemented. And that's what I find fascinating - that the controversy/games doesn't start and end on the guilt/sentencing of an individual; that these same games are played at the implementation stage. That makes absolutely no sense to me. The fact this 'complication' even arises suggests a major noncompliance with the law, by those who have sworn to uphold those very laws - again, similar to the 'sanctuary cities' problem.

[Phillip Allen]

Re: Imposing political will outside of the democratic process

Phillip, one wishes that you and other gun owners could understand a gesture of compromise. "Reasonable" is a matter of debate, inevitably, but there are already laws that have passed constitutional muster that limit the types of firearms one may even have or use for certain purposes. That's partly why we don't have those eight foot long cannon sized shotguns for bringing down a few hundred ducks at a blast. Or 50 cal machine guns for arial hunting of deer. Unfortunatly, there will be no debate if one side simply cleves to the position that there is no such thing as a legitimate or acceptable law defining and governing gun use and ownership.

we've got that...you are suggesting in strong language that we do not

[Phillip Allen]

Re: Imposing political will outside of the democratic process

Maybe those combatants guilty of hijacking this thread would be so kind as to start their own (abortion) thread? Sheesh! And I see nothing about this topic that should ignite the usual hyperbole of the tinderbox titles.

Variations on these drugs are used in medicine/anesthesia; no doubt there are any number of other drugs that could be substituted - but it's my perception (could be wrong) that prisons find it difficult to get 'medical cooperation' in this department; it also appears that any given protocol must be reviewed/endorsed before it can be implemented. And that's what I find fascinating - that the controversy/games doesn't start and end on the guilt/sentencing of an individual; that these same games are played at the implementation stage. That makes absolutely no sense to me. The fact this 'complication' even arises suggests a major noncompliance with the law, by those who have sworn to uphold those very laws - again, similar to the 'sanctuary cities' problem.

I understand

[Ian McColgin]

Re: Imposing political will outside of the democratic process

I really don't think the example of execution drugs is really quite the same as a minority obstructing and trying to nullify. It has always been the case that physicians really don't want to cooperate with executing healthy people. Nothing odd there. There are plenty of lethal drugs - vetinary medicine depends on them - and killing mammels with a minimum of pain is reasonably well understood but getting unskilled people to do it right is tough. So the states depend on dummy-proof mixes which indeed are increasingly hard to obtain.

If you want humane, at least so it's believed and at that only the moment of death and not the conscious anticipation, it's hard to beat Dr. Guilliotine.

Or maybe the states that still kill might consider just why the people with the medical skill are so unwilling and take it from there.

I don't think the matters of deep value - abortion, guns, or death penalty - are good examples of anti-democratic behavior. Rather, attempts at forcing one's minority way on stuff that's really not life or death, that's really just about winning or loosing a political point is where it goes anti-democratic. Where it goes anti-democratic with the big values is not in resistance, but only when that resistance takes the step to outlaw behavior.

[pefjr]

Re: Imposing political will outside of the democratic process

Regardless of whether you agree with these folks, what's your take on this disregard for duly determined law?

We all are guilty of this to a certain degree. It's when laws are broken, that I see a problem. There are also a lot of laws(supposedly democratically put there) on the books not enforced at all, like blaspheme laws. So it a good thing in some cases.