Scalia Dismisses 'Living Constitution:


PONCE, Puerto Rico - People who believe the Constitution would break if it didn't change with society are "idiots,"
U.S. Supreme Court Justice
Antonin Scalia says.

In a speech Monday sponsored by the conservative Federalist Society, Scalia defended his long-held belief in sticking to the plain text of the Constitution "as it was originally written and intended."

"Scalia does have a philosophy, it's called originalism," he said. "That's what prevents him from doing the things he would like to do," he told more than 100 politicians and lawyers from this U.S. island territory.

According to his judicial philosophy, he said, there can be no room for personal, political or religious beliefs.

Scalia criticized those who believe in what he called the "living Constitution."

"That's the argument of flexibility and it goes something like this: The Constitution is over 200 years old and societies change. It has to change with society, like a living organism, or it will become brittle and break."

"But you would have to be an idiot to believe that," Scalia said. "The Constitution is not a living organism, it is a legal document. It says something and doesn't say other things."

Proponents of the living constitution want matters to be decided "not by the people, but by the justices of the Supreme Court."

"They are not looking for legal flexibility, they are looking for rigidity, whether it's the right to abortion or the right to homosexual activity, they want that right to be embedded from coast to coast and to be unchangeable," he said.

Scalia was invited to Puerto Rico by the Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies. The organization was founded in 1982 as a debating society by students who believed professors at the top law schools were too liberal. Conservatives and libertarians mainly make up the 35,000 members.

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It's not oftent that such arrogance is in plain view by someone so powerful, but we're in the Bush age where that's the norm it seems.

Scalia not only disses a large part of the population, he insults other members of the Supreme Court, with a rather ridiculous assertion contradicts itself by the mere existance of the court.

If you were literally sticking to the text of the Constitution, you wouldn't need a Supreme Court at all.

If you're sticking to the Constitution "as it was originally written and intended." then your interperting it for male, white landowners and no one else, right? Because if you're not, then you've already stepped away from Originalism and into interpertation, as I've mentioned before.

The arguement disintigrates as soon as you've left that.

But, like I said, I've mentioned that before.

What gets me, it that you can't actually discuss the issue, like numerous other issues of the day, without name calling, an that people that should show some professionalism act like arrogant little turds with this "I'm right, you're wrong Nyah, nyah, nyah" attitude.

It does nothing to further your arguement, even if it wasn't a veiled attempt to push your own political agenda under the cover of neutrality, to insult reasonable people who disagree with you.

Especially those who sit beside you on the bench.