Literally everyone thinks their standard or morality is greater than the law. Otherwise I'm fine with questioning her decisions that's just a dumb criticism.
It's fine for you and I to have our own opinions on the law and weigh the morality of a given statute or regulation, or whether or not we want to obey it -- that can be text book civil disobedience after all. Ultimately the ends of civil disobedience would be to get an unjust law abolished or rewritten, etc. to be more equitable. Otherwise if one wants to change the law, one gets involved in legislation [running for office, campaigning on a referendum type vote, etc] or issues advocacy on some level, perhaps even including lawsuits etc.
But it's not the role of any judge to arbitrarily decide to impose their individual morals on the rest of society in place of the Constitution -- that's now we get Ginsburgs and [insert any activist Left Wing judge]. I just want them to decided if the case before them violates the Constitution, and our laws, as written, or not. That is their only function.
Amy's opinion is rather simple for deconflicting these things (ie, her morality vs US law) -- sit it out. However, I don't want a jurist who is going to be potentially sitting out of VERY important cases and leaving it up to the rest. We deserve better.
For instance, from her own writings on the death penalty, this is her thinking on the conflict of morals/faith vs US law:
This puts Catholic judges in a bind. They are obliged by oath, professional commitment, and the demands of citizenship to enforce the death penalty. They are also obliged to adhere to their church's teaching on moral matters. The legal system has a solution for this dilemma-it allows (indeed it requires) the recusal of judges whose convictions keep them from doing their job. This is a good solution. But it is harder than you think to de- termine when a judge must recuse himself and when he may stay on the job. Catholic judges will not want to shirk their judicial obligations. They will want to sit whenever they can without acting immorally. So they need to know what the church teaches, and its effect on them. On the other hand litigants and the general public are entitled to impartial justice, and that may be something that a judge who is heedful of eccle- siastical pronouncements cannot dispense. We need to know whether judges are sometimes legally disqualified from hearing cases that their consciences would let them decide.
I just don't want someone on the bench to decide that they cannot possibly consider a death penalty case, for instance, because of her (or the Vatican's) interpretation of the Bible, etc. There are lot of times death penalty cases (or potential cases) might wend their way up to the Supreme Court. Terrorism jumps out as one which has been extremely relevant in recent years.
Again, the bigger issue is just what, exactly, are the limits of when she may recuse -- and what other Church Doctrine will be handed down which she may feel compelled to abide by over the laws of the US?
Final Thought: Would you accept this if the Judge was Muslim and refused to render verdicts on cases which went against Sharia law? I suspect not.
Literally everyone thinks their standard or morality is greater than the law. Otherwise I'm fine with questioning her decisions that's just a dumb criticism.
It's fine for you and I to have our own opinions on the law and weigh the morality of a given statute or regulation, or whether or not we want to obey it -- that can be text book civil disobedience after all. Ultimately the ends of civil disobedience would be to get an unjust law abolished or rewritten, etc. to be more equitable. Otherwise if one wants to change the law, one gets involved in legislation [running for office, campaigning on a referendum type vote, etc] or issues advocacy on some level, perhaps even including lawsuits etc.
But it's not the role of any judge to arbitrarily decide to impose their individual morals on the rest of society in place of the Constitution -- that's now we get Ginsburgs and [insert any activist Left Wing judge]. I just want them to decided if the case before them violates the Constitution, and our laws, as written, or not. That is their only function.
Amy's opinion is rather simple for deconflicting these things (ie, her morality vs US law) -- sit it out. However, I don't want a jurist who is going to be potentially sitting out of VERY important cases and leaving it up to the rest. We deserve better.
For instance, from her own writings on the death penalty, this is her thinking on the conflict of morals/faith vs US law:
I just don't want someone on the bench to decide that they cannot possibly consider a death penalty case, for instance, because of her (or the Vatican's) interpretation of the Bible, etc. There are lot of times death penalty cases (or potential cases) might wend their way up to the Supreme Court. Terrorism jumps out as one which has been extremely relevant in recent years.
Again, the bigger issue is just what, exactly, are the limits of when she may recuse -- and what other Church Doctrine will be handed down which she may feel compelled to abide by over the laws of the US?
Final Thought: Would you accept this if the Judge was Muslim and refused to render verdicts on cases which went against Sharia law? I suspect not.
[https://scholarship.law.nd.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1523&context=law_faculty_scholarship]