Activist Schlafly urging grass-roots effort to limit judicial activism
Posted on Friday, April 21, 2006
URL: http://www.nwanews.com/bcdr/News/33820/
ROGERS — Before an evening meeting of the Arkansas Eagle Forum that Phyllis Schlafly was set to address Thursday, the conservative activist anticipated urging Arkansas members of the group to take strong action. They should work to make sure Congress votes to limit liberal judicial activism, Schlafly said.
Schlafly, 81, has been a national leader of the conservative movement since the publication of her best-selling 1964 book, "A Choice, Not An Echo." Eight years later, in 1972, she founded a national volunteer organization now called Eagle Forum and led a successful effort to defeat the proposed Equal Rights Amendment.
She also founded and serves as president of the Eagle Forum Education and Legal Defense Fund, a conservative think tank.
A lawyer turned political activist, Schlafly is the author of 20 books on varied subjects, including feminism, nuclear strategy and education.
Redefining the relationship of government to the Boy Scouts, removing the phrase "under God" from the Pledge of Allegiance or offering a new, inferior understanding of property rights, many courts have been practicing an uncalled-for brand of liberal activism, Schlafly charged.
Under Article III of the U.S. Constitution, Congress can limit the jurisdiction of the courts to reign in such excesses, and bills to do just that are already in Congress. But members of Congress will be unlikely to vote for such legislation unless they hear from Eagle Forum members and others of their constituents who insist they do so, Schlafly said.
Congress’ reluctance to limit judicial activism is reminiscent of its reluctance, until recently, to act on illegal immigration. It’s not hard to figure out what stirred members of Congress recently to action on that issue, and what will stir them again, Schlafly said. "The reason is they heard from the grass roots," she said.
Two recent appointments of conservatives by President George W. Bush may move one court, the U.S. Supreme Court, in the right direction. But the appointments won’t be enough to solve the problem of what she termed "judicial tyranny," Schlafly said. "There may be a slight improvement," she said.
She’s heard some pessimism among Republicans about the party’s chances of having a successful election year in 2006, but she doesn’t subscribe to it, Schlafly said. Some people may not have a high opinion of the job Congress is doing, but that is not the only view they will take to the voting booth this year, she said. "I’m not as pessimistic. Most people like their own congressman," Schlafly said.
Conservative political pundit Bay Buchanan, the former treasurer of the United States and president of the American Cause, was also scheduled to address the group.