On Roe, Alito cites a judge who treated women as witches and property

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

In his recently leaked draft majority opinion overturning Roe v. Wade, Supreme Court Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. presents what he sees as his most convincing arguments for permitting legislatures to ban abortion. So what is the best Alito can do? One of his prominent strategies is to repeatedly quote and discuss someone he describes as a “great” and “eminent” legal authority, Sir Matthew Hale.

Most Americans have probably never heard of Hale, an English judge and lawyer who lived from 1609 to 1676. Hale was on the bench so long ago that his judgeship included presiding over a witchcraft trial where he sentenced two “witches” to death.

-snip-

Hale was not writing for women, who were excluded from the legal profession and judiciary. But he had much to say about women. For example, his pronouncements on rape were bedrocks of American law for generations, and their influence persists.

Hale believed that authorities should distrust women who reported having been raped. In his mind, rape was “an accusation easily to be made and hard to be proved, and harder to be defended by the party accused, tho never so innocent.” Judges and lawyers endlessly quoted Hale’s canard well into the second half of the 20th century. Echoes of Hale’s suspicion of women still reverberate in American law and culture, helping rapists avoid punishment.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/05/09/alito-roe-sir-matthew-hale-misogynist/

[Blue Owl]

1. Alito is a misogynistic sick fuck who should be stripped of his robe

[world wide wally]

3. WTF does Matthew Hale have to do with America which was formed a hundred years after

he croaked?

[Celerity]

7. Hale is best known for his "History of the Pleas of the Crown," a treatise published posthumously in

1736 that became wildly popular with judges and lawyers in England and America. In my years studying women’s legal history, I have read hundreds of American judicial opinions quoting Hale’s treatise.

https://archive.org/details/historiaplacitor01hale/page/n3/mode/2up

[appalachiablue]

4. Who can believe this regression

[cbwrongblog]

5. https://cbwrong.blogspot.com/

I saw headlines that Clarence Thomas was complaining about America not wanting to live with the outcome that we don’t like. I found that an interesting statement from the husband of Ginni Thomas. Ginni Thomas has been in the news about encouraging of the dismantling of our democracy by the promotion of the Big Lie Campaign by the Trump Administration. To me, she was calling for political discourse to stop the legitimate transfer of power. She wanted to help keep the man that was not elected for a second term in the White House. He singles out young people when he should also be signaling out his own wife. Clarence Thomas’ words are like the pot calling the kettle black. His wife did not want to live with an outcome that she didn’t like. It looks like she went about trying to be disruptive and a bully to change the outcome.

When the investigating authority wanted many of the documents from the Trump Administration the decision went all the way to the Supreme Court. All but one Judge voted that the documents should be turned over to the Investigating Committee. That judge was Clarence Thomas whose wife was encouraging the political discourse. He used his position on the Supreme Court to try and hide the truth about his wife from the American public. Why is this not in the headlines every time he opens his mouth to be quoted? The public should know that he does not deserve to be on the court. It should be because the public should know at times he is not an honest man.

When it came to Roe vs Wade did Justice Thomas complain about the fact that they were ruling on the case because people didn’t want to live with the decisions that the courts had already made? No, he doesn’t talk about that at all. In fact none of the Conservative Justices have mentioned that fact at all. They should have stated that it is Congress’s job to change and pass laws. It is the Court’s job then to interpret that law. When they were confirmed they said that it was the “law of the land” but I think that too many times people lie just to be confirmed. Turns out that they all wanted to change the “law of the land”. They seem to show a lack of respect for the people that have filled their chairs before them. In some ways they are like the very people that Thomas is complaining about. People not wanting to accept the decision of the people that were commissioned to make those decisions before them. In reality, Thomas is one of those young people that he is complaining about. He did not want to accept what other courts have upheld. When the Supreme Court’s lack respect for the process then the process is very flawed.

Just the fact that we have so called liberal or conservative justices to me is disgusting. The fact that Moscow Mitch McConnell is so proud that he has stacked the court with conservative Judges scares me. I would think that stacking the Courts with people that will help preserve our Constitution and our government should be the goal. The Court’s goal should not be to further the conservative or the liberal goal. The Courts should be about preserving rights not taking them away. Gerrymandering is voter suppression whether it is the Democrats or the Republicans. What does the Court do to ensure fair elections? They turn their back on them. They wouldn’t even here about gerrymandering. Something that affects our republic a lot more than abortion, they would not have anything to do with. I have written before that when the Supreme Court becomes a tool of the oppressor that this country is in for a bad hair day. Well guess what? That day has arrived.

What rights will they come after next? Will they come after the separation of Church and State more than they already have? Are we going to have a government and then a Magisterium that is above the government? Religious rule that is above the law. The fastest growing religion in the world is Islam. What if that religion is Islam? I would rather keep religion out of our government completely. Sharia law whether it is Christian or Muslim is not a good thing. Interracial marriage has not been legal much longer than abortion. There are conservatives that believe that interracial marriage is wrong. The mixing of the races. Will they eventually come after that? Many will say that I am overreacting which I may be. I am sure there were more than one Jew in Germany that said that about how dangerous Hitler was. Conservatives are already banning books in our school libraries. Will they start burning them next? Conservative are suppressing history. Conservatives do not want education they want indoctrination.

Is our court system becoming something that is more or less just a tool of a restrictive government that is more like Russia? They hold elections in Russia but there really is no democracy and there really is no suspense to what the outcome will be. Putin’s ruling party wins. I am afraid that is what conservatives want. There are conservatives and then there is everyone else. They label them all as liberals among other things just to try and gain the upper hand. This has been done before in history but then that is why they suppress education.

[FakeNoose]

6. Welcome to DU

[llashram]

8. good post

I feel...