“IDEA” FORMAT

Law Class, March 26, 2016

1. The way to answer:

a) any and all law exam questions;

b) to enable you to prepare for court appearances using NOSA (Notice of Special Appearance);

c) and prepare motions and briefs;

2. Cite as many cases and statutes as you wish to.

3. Don’t count the number of words, but ABCD the answer.

4. ABCD approach - (Accurate, Brief, Clear, Direct)

Make your point using IDEA mnemonics:

Example: Here is an Answer to an examination question or when preparing a Motion for the court (ecclesiastical, tribal, state or federal court:

The principal issue (the I in IDEA) in this matter before the Court is whether the US Constitution and the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) of 1996 are on all fours.

The secondary issue is whether a granting of a right or a privilege to same-sex marriage will open the floodgates for similar claims of rights especially when the Constitution makes no provision for this right or privilege.

(Next, you describe and define (the D in IDEA)

The Constitution makes no provision for the creation of new rights although the Court in Roe v. Wade (1973), in a 7-2 decision, created such a right by "finding" a woman's "right to privacy." The 4th Amendment mandates that no one shall be subject to "unreasonable searches." Therefore, the right to privacy is suspect, and not on terra firma as is the right to associate and seek a sense of union and partnership.

The LGBT community is asking the apex court to make new law, find a new right, carve out a new privilege from the Constitution. This is reprehensible and unjust when seen from the moral point of view. But, I believe SCOTUS be moved and motivated by balancing morals and societal needs.

When we evaluate and examine the issue, any observer of the Supreme Court and the Constitution will realize that almost every decision is a political one. There are 30 million votes that can be garnered from the LGBT community and from the liberals. Should the SCOTUS play politics? No. Do they indulge in politics? Yes. SCOTUS is thus not deciding and judging but actively involved in social engineering. That is not its constitutional mandate. It is going beyond its enumerated powers outlined in Article III. Impeachment is looming dangerously over the heads of the nine justices.

Another point is that the SCOTUS is attempting to be popular, politically correct and constitutionally divided on the issue of special rights that are not implied in the supreme law of the land. When Justice Kennedy, supposedly a Conservative joined the Court, everyone thought he would be the swing vote for conservatism. But he became the swing vote for liberalism. He overruled Bowers v. Hardwicke in Texas v. Johnson, and paved the way for consensual homosexual sodomy while advancing the proposition that the federal courts have no business legislating morals. But all law comes from ethics and morals drawing its life-support from the Scriptures which mandate morals. On this score, I believe the SCOTUS has stepped into legalistic thickets and brambles, and thus finds it hard to hack its way out to the clear sunlit path.

The tertiary issue to be evaluated and examined is that the SCOTUS is the final authority of saying what the law, or declaring the law, or interpreting the law. The SCOTUS seems to condemn DOMA as a throwback to the Middle Ages. DOMA is yet to be jettisoned as unconstitutional law. The SCOTUS has clearly stepped beyond its enumerated powers in Article III of the Constitution. The citizenry ought to ask: is it a crime to disobey an unjust law?

What then is the proper solution to apply the law not just through the rule of law but employing every method to satisfy and justify the cause of justice.

First, the DOMA is a law that respects the union between a man and a woman in marriage as was ordained under eternal law, divine law, natural law (God’s Law). Some have even suggested that animals have no problem distinguishing between male and female; so why should humans go against the order of nature.

If it is a question of choice between the rule of law or the cause of justice, then an argument can be made that the written law is not as important as the cause of justice because legislatures only writes laws, not literature on the cause of justice. The cause of justice comes from a very long historical background having had developed over centuries of experience, exposure, and experiment with written laws which come from the sense and sensibility of justice.

So, the cause of justice is the clear path to applying the correct solution and remedy to the issue of same-sex marriage despite constitutional language that seems to clears a path to same-sex unions.

First Amendment - Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

So, the COTUS grants, guarantees and promises five freedoms (rights )– religion, speech, press, assembly, petitions.

WHERE is the freedom of association?

James Madison was against the freedom of association because of cliques and factions.

Madison feared that factions (groups or cliques) would gain too much power and harm the founding ideas in the Constitution.

“In order to lay a due foundation for that separate and distinct exercise of the different powers of government, which to a certain extent is admitted on all hands to be essential to the preservation of liberty, it is evident that each department should have a will of its own; and consequently should be so constituted that the members of each should have as little agency as possible in the appointment of the members of the others.”

“But what is government itself, but the greatest of all reflections on human nature? If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.”

Judges were not buying into this philosophy which in Madison’s own words are self-contradictory because of the constant fear of 1789 French Revolution when a large faction stormed the bastille and lobbed off the head of the king and the queen of France. In 1842 Chief Justice Lemuel Shaw declared that the right of workingmen to form their own associations without a special license from the State is sacrosanct. Chief Justice Taft affirmed this in American Steel Foundries v. Tri-City Central Trades Council, 257 U.S 184 (1921).

Labor unions became popular untl they were slowly de-registered as corporations became bigger and more powerful so they could buy into government favors and instill, mortal fear in perpetuity

So, the cause of justice prevailed over the written law about associations involving working people. Their livelihoods depended on associating with other working people so that unions could bargain for better working conditions and contracts regarding pay.

But, DOMA is a written law at the top of a moral ground that only men and women can marry when implying that same-sex marriage is not lawful, legal or legitimate – meaning immoral

Class – here is where you get to complete the A as in Apply in IDEA>

THIS is the way to present your answers, so u don't leave anything out. NO cut and paste jobs, please. Im trying to get u to think on your feet. You will NOT have time in court to refer to notes.

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