I found a copy of Texas AG Greg Abbott’s Amicus brief here. It’s an incredibly boring read. Now I remember why I didn’t change my major to pre-law after I took that Constitutional Law class way back when. It was an upper division class, but three weeks into the course I discovered that I was surrounded by law students who were auditing the class because the prof was actually a famous litigator. I didn’t know him from Adam and can’t recall his name.
Anyway, when you wade through all the verbiage it comes down to this: there is no time test in the AG’s argument. Besides that, his argument for filing the brief reveals that the AG is nothing but a politically motivated kibitzer. Small surprise.
The AG’s brief relies heavily on Jones v. Bush a suit filed by someone who challenged Dick Cheney’s eligibility to become Vice President, because of his residency. The 12th Amendment to the constitution changed the way we elect the president and vice president. Before 1804 the vice president was the guy who came in 2nd in the presidential election. A wholly bad idea that the 12th amendment corrected to what we have today. But there is a requirement that the president and vice president must come from different states.
“The electors shall meet in their respective states and vote by ballot for President and Vice-President, one of whom, at least, shall not be an inhabitant of the same state with themselves”.In Jones, the argument was that Dick and George were both residents of Texas, but Dick sought an end-around by doing exactly what Tom did; he moved back to his home state of Wyoming 5 months before the election.
Interesting. Dick, moved to Wyoming to become eligible, Tom moved to Virginia to become ineligible.
But here’s the kicker. There is no time requirement in the 12th Amendment. It does not specifically say by what time Dick needed to be a resident, just that he is. In TDP et al. v. Benkiser there is a date – must be a resident of the state on election day - and the date is the crux of one of TDP’s arguments. You can’t declare Tom ineligible before November 7, 2006 – election day. Gee. I guess they missed that.
Abbott, kibitz on your own time.
Secondary to this is the argument that Judge Sparks’ ruling declared a section of the Texas Election Code unconstitutional. Because of this, Abbott claims that he has a reason to file the Amicus. Tripe. Sparks never declared that section of the TEC unconstitutional. They fabricated a false and specious reason to file the brief. Fellow Texans, I hope they did this on their dime, and not on “company time”. But I am not an optimist here (See blog title).
6 comments:
I know someone who said he was going to check on the "on their own dime" thing. You have to assume taxpayer's money was spent on that little partisan project. Not good.
I decided not to go into law when I took a Constitutional Law class too. I loved the class and the readings. My turn-off was that it had the most obvious widespread cheating during tests of any class I ever took.
Gary -
When I was at university, the only cheaters were in the pre-med program. I can get with the disillusionment, because in my first 6 weeks of my university experience, I was a pre-med. I became totally disillusioned when I saw (then) very expenive calculators being passed down the row.
This is another issue and one that I will gladly touch on in the future. I am a fair-minded man and believe that people should behave honestly and above board - tests are a legitimate assessment of what is learned. Cheating is abhorrent to upstanding people.
That probably makes me an anachronism. And also a Democrat. Although, let me emphasize, Democrats are not anachronistic, they are just a very fair-minded subset of our population, and want a our government to be transparent. Internal machinations should be visible to all that want to examine them (without fees).
Let me end this with a very ominous joke that has been passed around for a few years now:
Q: "What do you call a person who finished last in his class at Med School?"
A: "Doctor".
Thanks for reading.
- H
Muse:
I hate it that our tax dollars are spent on political forays. Greg Abbott needs a serious vacation. I hear that David Van Os would be willing to 'spell' him for a few years if the voters agree. PEOPLE: Your State Attorney General is NOT working for you. He is working for himself and his party. He is using YOUR tax money to advocate his party's (and his own) political ends. Get rid of this bum.
David Van Os WILL work for we, the common people of this state. He is ONE OF US. Abbott is a drone of the Republican machine. He can't (or should I say, he can't have his underlings) file a decent brief.
Get with it Texas. The man is a menace who has modeled himself on a completely discredited 'Tom DeLay' ideal - he wants to be like "our Tom".
Turn him out. We deserve a better man and David Van Os is one heck of a feisty man who will fight for your interests.
And that is all I have to say about that.
- H
I'm a single parent in Dallas - and Greg Abbott has performed just as poorly in his fudiciary responsibilities regarding child support establishment and enforcement. I've been in contact with a former employee of Abbott's.
This employee shared child support horror stories that she personally made Abbott aware. His response was to send her a form letter stating he regretted she was unhappy in her job. He completely turned a deaf ear to her efforts to "whistle blow" on the system.
I too believe in David Van Os. I hope readers will also visit and sign our petition for child support reform. www.petitiononline.com Type: Texas OAG
It's bitter sweet to see others feel the way I do, sadly however at the expense of the citizens of the state of Texas, Abbott has made a mockery of our government.
Sandi
The Texas AG's office can openly files false charges just to make their position stronger in child support cases. The best part is when one takes them to court, they back down but never admit to falsifying charges.
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