{"article":{"id":9096,"heading":"National Lawyers Guild Launches Exploratory Campaign--Impeach the Supreme Court","author":"Heidi Bogosian, National Lawyers Guild","created":"2001-08-03 14:40:39","modified":"2001-08-05 06:54:23","last_modified":"Sun, 05 Aug 2001 13:54:23","article":"

From: Heidi Bogosian <director@nlg.org<\/a>>

Subject: Impeaching the Supreme Court

July 20, 2001

Dear Friends,

The National Lawyers Guild is exploring the legal, economic and viable political grounds for launching a broad-based impeachment campaign against the five members of the Bush v. Gore majority on the Supreme Court.

We are writing to ask for your input, support and, if possible, endorsement of the projected campaign.

We have a commitment from a very high ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee that he will introduce the bills of impeachment if we can create the political support to back up serious campaign effort.

At our recent meeting, our National Executive Committee voted to recommend to its members at the Guild's National Convention in October that the Guild launch such a campaign based on considered discussion of the illegitimacy of the Supreme Court following its misconduct in last fall's election and in the context of their other recent decisions unconstitutionally assaulting civil and economic rights.

Our recommendation, however, is contingent on a decision by the Guild Convention this October that the political support and viable legal grounds exist for such a campaign.

We are thus approaching a range of organizations in the next two months to ask for \"sense of the body\" resolutions, letters from directors, or even full endorsements so that we can assess the real support for mounting a successful campaign. The National Lawyers Guild intends to commit serious resources to the campaign if our national convention endorses it, but we must first evaluate whether and to what extent such support exists. We would be glad to provide you with copies of the materials we are circulating debating the potential campaign which will be located at our web site.

To be clear about our strategic approach, we very specifically will NOT be arguing that our democratic system would have been fine if the Supreme Court had not intervened and Gore won. We are framing this campaign in the broadest terms connecting the whole set of issues of electoral disenfranchisement and connecting it to the range of rightwing court decisions that are rolling back the civil and economic rights of our nation.

Below is the resolution approved at the NEC meeting. We are devoting one of our main plenaries at the Convention solely to this topic:

\"We recommend to the convention that the National Lawyers Guild support an impeachment campaign if we determine that it will be politically effective. Whereas the NEC believes that the Supreme Court violated the law, Whereas impeachment may contribute to the opposition to the right-wing judicial takeover, Therefore, be it resolved, that the NEC endorses a campaign to impeach the \"Felonious Five\" majority of the Supreme Court contingent on a decision by the convention that there are legal, economic and viable political grounds for such a campaign.\"

We appreciate your organization's support and thoughts on this endeavor.

Please send endorsements or refer questions to impeachment@nlg.org<\/a> or call 212-627-2656. Please also

check our web site for informational materials and updates at

http:\/\/www.nlg.org\/Impeachment\/Impeachment_Index.htm<\/a>



In Solidarity,

Heidi Bogosian

Executive Director

National Lawyers Guild

==================

Background on the NLG: The National Lawyers Guild is an association of lawyers, legal workers, law students and jailhouse lawyers committed to fighting social injustice in this country and internationally. Founded in 1937, the Guild has been at the forefront of the legal and political struggles of ordinary people to end oppression and discrimination in our society for over sixty years.<\/p>\n","contact":"director@nlg.org","link":"http:\/\/www.nlg.org\/impeachment\/default.htm","address":"","phone":"","parent_id":0,"mime_type":"text\/plain","summary":"The National Lawyers Guild (NLG) is exploring the legal, economic and viable political grounds for launching a broad-based impeachment campaign against the five members of the Bush v. Gore majority on the Supreme Court. The NLG is asking for input, support and endorsements. A \"very high ranking member\" of the House Judiciary Committee has indicated he will introduce bills of impeachment if we can create the political support to back up serious campaign effort. This is NOT simply arguing against Bush v. Gore, but against the broader anti-democratic agenda of the conservative activist justices.","numcomment":4,"fileurl":"\/uploads\/","filesize":null,"article_url":"\/news\/2001\/08\/9096.php"},"attachments":[],"comments":[{"id":9110,"heading":"GO FOR IT!!!","article":"\r\n\r\n While I personnaly supported Ralph Nader as a more democratic alternative to a Gore regime, it's emphatically clear that what the \"Supreme\" Court did in stopping the Florida ballot re-count just as it appeared that Gore was about to move ahead of Bush was a commission of outright electoral fraud. The \"Felonious Five\" NEED to be impeached to put an end to this de-facto coup and Bush family dictatorship!","author":"anti-fascist","parent_id":9096,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2001-08-03 23:43:03","modified":"2001-08-04 00:00:01","fileurl":""},{"id":9126,"heading":"Allright !!!","article":"Even though I'm not a Democrat I think that Gore simply would be a lesser evil. The Bush \"putschists\" must be kicked out of the White House at any cost. It is for the sake of democracy, the environment, international security !","author":"Anti-Bush","parent_id":9096,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2001-08-04 14:55:10","modified":"2001-08-04 16:00:02","fileurl":""},{"id":9127,"heading":"Endorsed","article":"Yes! Go! Do it! Bugliosi has made the case plain. Dershowitz is highly critical of the \"Felonious Five\" as well. Kick them out! They stole our democracy from us. They deserve to be in prison!","author":"Hieronymous D","parent_id":9096,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2001-08-04 16:01:33","modified":"2001-08-04 17:00:01","fileurl":""},{"id":9138,"heading":"put out the lights on the age of reason...","article":"at the very least, gore is (apparently) not quite so hard-right, and not so religious in his approach to political facade. naturally, though, it would aggravate a great many sheep, er, good, honest americans. might touch off the next inquisition that would be the next \"logical\" step following this dark age of willful ignorance. and we all know who the witches will be this time around, eh? \r\n\r\n i would say it makes sense to discover the truth, and so would many others here.\r\n\r\nof course, so would copernicus.\r\n\r\nkeep it clever.","author":"wind in the tree","parent_id":9096,"mime_type":"text\/plain","created":"2001-08-05 06:54:23","modified":"2001-08-05 08:00:02","fileurl":""}]}