“Our Constitution was not written in the sands to be washed away by each wave of new judges blown in by each successive political wind.”

Hugo Black, author

Should the United States do away with government? I have been thinking lately that if I could do it all over again, I would rather be a lawyer or, even better, a judge at the federal level.

I grew up with the misconception that all that judges did was put criminals into prisons, usually more than once in the criminal’s lifetime. With all the news about government at all levels being sued by someone or by a group, I would have to believe that being a judge would be a guaranteed job for life. I just wouldn’t want to be a state judge in Maine with the rumors and all about them being underpaid.

I never thought that I would live to see the day where no matter what an elected body decided or, even worse, what the people decided at the polls, could be so easily thrown out by a judge or panel of judges. It’s almost as if our votes never counted in the first place, which is something many people have said for years. Just remember the “hanging chad” dangling from ballots during the 2000 Bush/Gore race which was decided after the Supreme Court made its decision. That wasn’t the first time the Supreme Court decided who became president because when one looks at how Rutherford B. Hayes became our 19th president, it is easy to see how elected officials, political parties and the Supreme Court ultimately made him president. I’ll skip a lot of details but most important was the fact a neutral member of the Supreme Court excused himself so that one friendly with Hayes’ party along with members of a congressional committee would help decide who would be president. After buying off the Southern votes, Hayes became president and the South turned into a solid block for the Democrats.

Sometimes I think that we should just do away with government at all levels and place a judge in every city and town along with some for every state. It would save us a whole lot of money by lowering our taxes because we would no longer have elections or elected officials. Think about this for a moment. An elected body like the Portland City Council makes a decision that places a ban on individuals standing on traffic medians in Portland supposedly for safety reasons, although many would state that the purpose of the ban was to keep homeless people from begging from those medians in the first place. The city is sued and loses the lawsuit. What happens if one of those homeless individuals slips on ice on one of those medians and is run over by a car? Is someone going to hold the driver of that vehicle responsible or will it fall back on the judge(s) who made the decision in the first place?

Another highly visible case involving a legal decision is the decision by the Portland City Council to ban demonstrators from standing within 39 feet from the Planned Parenthood clinic. Of course a couple of the demonstrators are now suing the city for violating their so-called rights, which ultimately will be decided by a judge or judges. What this boils down for me is whose rights supercedes another’s rights? I would think that it would make better sense to have the people decide instead of a judge making a decision on what he/she believes.

I have to wonder how long our country can survive if this trend of judges overturning the decisions of citizens and government continues? When it comes right down to it, President Obama has stated that Congress can go to Hell as far as he is concerned so that he can do what he wants to get his way. Somehow I have a feeling the U.S. Supreme Court is going to become involved at some point as the President bullies his initiatives forward.

Lane Hiltunen, of Windham, says beam me up, Scotty. There’s no intelligent life here.