Who is active and who is not?

[Lars]

A professor at Yale Law School, Paul Gewirtz and one of his graduate students, Chad Golder, have researched Supreme Court decisions to see which justices are the most "activist".

The most activist a judge can be, is when he or she votes to overturn legislation that has been passed by Congress or any state legislature. A lot of people, mainly on the right, complain about "activist" judges, but they will be surprised who has been most activist and who has, by overturning laws, been the most activist.

Here is the list:

Thomas 65.63 %

Kennedy 64.06 %

Scalia 56.25 %

Rehnquist 46.88 %

O’Connor 46.77 %

Souter 42.19 %

Stevens 39.34 %

Ginsburg 39.06 %

Breyer 28.13 %

From this it is obvious that those justices who are considered to be the most conservative have voted to overturned laws more than those who are considered more liberal.

So, if the aim is to select judges who are the least activist, more liberal judges need to be nominated

[rifle]

I think the recent land grabbing ruling by the supreme court suggests the opposite. The liberal/socialist judges should be thrown off the bench. Let's see what happens to Justice Souter's property now that a developer has filed to take his ranch and build a hotel. I bet he gets exempt from his own ruling. This ruling is another example of proof that the left is NOT about helping the middle class as they always claim to be. They are socialist elitists who want nothing less than bigger government and total control of our life. Souter, Stevens, Kennedy, Ginsberg, and Breyer have blatantly twisted and re-interpreted the fifth amendment. Your home is no longer your home if someone else shows they can generate more tax revenue for the gov't with it.
I hope the general public will now see what the liberal/socialist agenda is about.

[Lars]

The Kelo decision has gotten a lot of hysteria started among those who really have no idea what it is all about. What the court did was to uphold a lower court decision, which declared that economic develpment can be one criteria for eminent domain. By no means did the court decide that is has to.

What the decision also was about is that local authorities should make such decisions rather than federal judges, but I guess some would prefer the opposite.

What this more liberal wing of the court has ruled recently is that people do indeed have a right to privacy, but I guess some do not like that either. They prefer that the government intrudes into private affairs.

It is rather amusing to see how easy some ingest certain propaganda slogans and then apply them to matters that they really do not understand. As it has been said, for every complex problem there is a solution that is simple, easy and wrong.

[rifle]

Prior to this ruling, eminent domain was limited to roadways, public utilities, and governmental buildings. NOT private companies (that's how walmart was kept out of some localities) ... this court has re-interpreted it now to mean anyone who can show they can develop the land better, is entitled to it, and private developers are already trying to kick people out of their homes.... thankfully there are state legislaters now working on their state laws to make this ruling a moot point in each of their states. Hopefully every state will do that.

[Lars]

That is not quite true. There is no automatic provision in that ruling and it is also based on precedents that the Supreme Court has ruled before, going back a hundred years.

What the ruling says, is that in this case, eminent domain is valid for private development. Other courts may use this ruling also as a precedent in some future cases, but there is no guarantee that they will prevail.