Congress need not set courts' dockets for them

defending the First Amendment against the Christian right ...

... because if Jews don't speak out, they'll think we don't mind

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Congress need not set courts' dockets for them

Rep. Sodrel's bill is out of order

Editorial, Chronicle-Tribune (Grant County, Indiana), February 28, 2006

Here's a quick civics lesson for Rep. Mike Sodrel:

Congress belongs to the legislative branch.
Courts belong to the judicial branch.
It's not up to Congress to tell courts what cases to review.

Sodrel, a Republican who represents Indiana's Ninth District in Congress, seems to have forgotten those basic points. He introduced a bill that would prohibit federal judges from ruling on the content of prayers in state legislatures.

Sodrel's bill comes not long after U.S. District Judge David Hamilton, ruling on prayers during official Indiana House sessions, prohibited prayers that endorse any specific religion.

Hamilton ruled that delivering a highly specific Christian prayer from the Indiana House speaker's podium amounted to an official endorsement of that religion by state government, which is unconstitutional. He also said prayers during official proceedings of the House must be nonsectarian.

"No court created by act of Congress," Sodrel's bill says, "shall have any jurisdiction, and the Supreme Court shall have no appellate jurisdiction, to hear or decide any question pertaining to the interpretation or the validity, under the Constitution, of the content of any speech of any member of state legislative body or any individual invited by a state legislative body to speak before that body, when such speech occurs during the legislative session of that body."

The catch, however, is that deciding "the interpretation or the validity, under the Constitution, of the content of any speech of any member of state legislative body or any individual invited by a state legislative body to speak before that body ..." is exactly what courts are supposed to do.

Sodrel's bill is an attempt by the legislative branch to tell the judicial branch that it wants to be immune from judicial review.

Wouldn't President George W. Bush or Gov. Mitch Daniels like that immunity for their executive branches? You bet they would.

Sodrel and the bill's backers say this is an effort to fight what they call judicial activism. It's a safe bet they wouldn't raise the "Judicial activism!" war cry about a decision they agreed with.

Sodrel gets an "F" for civics, and his bill should fail, too.

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