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Title: NRA taking Governor Cuomo, New York to court over 1st Amendment violations
Source:
HotAir
URL Source: https://hotair.com/archives/2018/05 ... ourt-1st-amendment-violations/
Published: May 12, 2018
Author: Jazz Shaw
Post Date: 2018-05-12 09:15:49 by Tooconservative
Keywords: None
Views: 1040
Comments: 7
Filed on May 11, 2018, in the United States District Court for the Northern District of New York, the lawsuit claims that Cuomo, Vullo, and DFS engaged in a “campaign of selective prosecution, backroom exhortations, and public threats” designed to coerce banks and insurance companies to withhold services from the NRA. The NRA argues that such tactics vastly overstep DFS’s regulatory mandate, and seek to suppress the speech of Second Amendment supporters and retaliate against the NRA and others for their political advocacy. The lawsuit seeks millions of dollars in damages to redress harms inflicted by the DFS campaign. “Political differences aside, our client believes the tactics employed by these public officials are aimed to deprive the NRA of its First Amendment right to speak freely about gun-related issues and in defense of the Second Amendment,” says William A. Brewer III, partner at Brewer, Attorneys & Counselors and counsel to the NRA. I’m still not entirely clear how this adds up to a First Amendment issue rather than some sort of suppression of trade question. The maneuvers in question involved an advisory letter sent by DFS to most of the banks and insurance companies doing business in the Empire State. The letter suggested the institutions should take action to avoid “reputational risk” which could supposedly arise from doing business with “gun promotion organizations.” The same day, the Governor himself issued a press release quoting DFS Superintendent Maria T. Vullo in which she urged all insurance companies and banks doing business in New York” to “discontinue their arrangements with the NRA.” The New York Post adds some additional background to the story, citing a recent $7M fine on the NRA’s insurance broker, Lockton Cos. The state claims that Lockton doesn’t have a license to do business in New York. But even if that’s the case, how would that justify an effort to blacklist the NRA from any business with banks and other insurance companies? Perhaps the better question is whether or not it’s legal for a state government to actively press businesses such as banks and insurance companies to cut ties with a group which is engaged in political activism and not breaking any laws. It certainly sounds like New York is doing something illegal here, but I’m hard pressed to say exactly what law is being violated. I’m not finding any similar examples to go by, possibly because this may be entirely unprecedented. Maybe there isn’t a specific law against it because nobody ever expected a state government to act in such a fashion. But a First Amendment violation? We’ll have to wait and see. Poster Comment: I have to like NRA's moxy in bringing this suit despite the long odds. Given how many judges Trump has appointed (over half of them replacing Dem-appointed federal judges), this might not be a bad bet for NRA. Maybe they think they have a good chance to prevail or to engage in discovery tactics. They are after something in a case this big. NRA may believe that this is the time to mount legal challenges and move the ball downfield in a year where gun rights have been revived as a salient political issue with Camera Hogg leading the gungrabbing charge, covered non-stop by the anti-gun libmedia.
The National Rifle Association appears to be sailing into some uncharted legal waters this week with a lawsuit targeting the Governor of New York and the state’s Department of Financial Services (DFS). The NRA claims that recent “regulatory” actions and advisories issued to banks doing business in New York represent a violation of the group’s First Amendment rights. While attacking the NRA is a proven winner politically for liberals like Cuomo (who is currently engaged in a primary battle, faces a general election in November and has 2020 presidential aspirations), the Governor may have gone too far this time and run afoul of the law. (NRA-ILA) The National Rifle Association of America (“NRA”) today announced that it filed a lawsuit against the New York State Department of Financial Services (“DFS”), New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, and DFS Superintendent Maria T. Vullo alleging violations of the NRA’s First Amendment rights.
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#1. To: Tooconservative (#0)
The outcome will depend on who appointed the presiding judges. If Mini-Mario or another CPUSA Governor appointed them,the NRA will lose. The judiciary was one of the first targets of the USSR and the Dim Party back in the 30's and 40's. In other words,it doesn't matter what the law SAYS anymore on any issue with political overtones. What matters is how the judges rule. Establish a legal precedent,and it's unlikely to ever be overturned until we become the North American Economic Zone of the NWO.
In the entire history of the world,the only nations that had to build walls to keep their own citizens from leaving were those with leftist governments.
You sound a lot like Vic on "judges rule". Even so, Mueller has run into two judges that were real buzz saws in the last 10 days, one of them a Reagan judge, the other appointed to the federal bench by Trump after 10 years on the federal sentencing guidelines board. And what were the chances of Mueller, having picked the Beltway to operate from so he could get friendlier judges, having that much trouble as soon as he got close to a courtroom? So I'm not so sure I'd bet against the NRA on this case. They aren't known for filing frivolous cases just for publicity. When they file, they do go for a win. They have a pretty serious legal team.
Anymore? Judges have ALWAYS ruled in our system. Remember, the Common Law judiciary existed in England from 1066 onward. Parliament did not become the supreme source of law until 1688. Laws have ALWAYS primarily been made by judges in our legal system, all the way back to the instant of its creation. In fact, our whole legal system was CREATED by judges, and they were the only active source of authority in it. Kings commanded armies, and they appointed judges to rule people by administering justice. Judges created the Common Law. All of it. Statutes only began to intrude into the law, and legislatures make law, a half-millennium later. Judges still are the final deciders of all law in our system. Since the French Revolution, the French have had a criminal statute making it a serious crime for a judge to cite judicial precedent in any decision. The French principle is that ALL law is made by the elected legislature, and that it is a crime for judges to attempt to make law or use "equity" - because the judge is nothing more than the mouth that pronounces the words of the law, and the law in its entirety, including all of the procedures for applying it, is the exclusive province of the elected legislature. The French adopted those criminal statutes specifically to crush out (and in the Revolutionary era, to decapitate) any sense of judicial independence and any sense of discretion. The purpose of the judge, in the French system, is to be the formal cop who executes the law upon those before the judge. The judge has no authority to set any rules about anything, and no authority to establish precedent, and it's a crime for a judge to cite to precedent. That's their system. Americans talk as though we have the French system, but we never did. Neither did England. Our law has been made by judges since the beginning, and judges alone set the precedential rules by which judges decide cases. Legislatures only began to intrude upon the judiciary in the 1500s and 1600s. America was founded by the English, who brought the Common Law with them, and the Common Law was incorporated into the Constitution. It uses Common law terms, and the Federal Courts have ALWAYS acted under the Common Law. None of this has ever been seriously questioned by Americans. I like to point out just how obnoxiously strong the American judiciary is, because I agree with the French. The funny thing is that most Americans actually also agree with the French, and think our system actually is structured like the French system, with all law originating in the legislature. But that's just ignorance on the part of the American people. That has NEVER been true, and it was never INTENDED to be true. The Constitution assumes the Common Law as its basis, and uses Common Law terms without defining them (such as habeas corpus, or "the right to...") . The entirety of the Common Law up to that time was made by judges in England, except in a couple of specific cases, and those were so rare that they were CALLED "statutes". The "Statute of Frauds", for example, refers to a specific statute from England from the late 1600s, by which Parliament created a written law to guide what had to be in writing. The Common Law judges found this USEFUL, so they didn't undermine it. Americans think like the French, but administer justice upon themselves like the English of the 1600s. Which is why the American justice system is so pathological, and also why it is so hard to reform: people for the most part do not even understand how it works, and will argue vehemently in their ignorance that it DOESN'T work the way it does. It works as intended - and it was INTENDED to be a means by which the King and the Upper Class could control the law and impose it on those below them,. It serves its original purpose well. Justice and equality before the law? It delivers justice from the perspective of the aristocracy, and its burdens and expenses are specifically DESIGNED to prevent most people from having access to its stronger forms. The system is DESIGNED to be able to easily execute peasants, but to make it hard to punish people who have the money to hire lawyers. That's the POINT of the private bar: the rich are entitled to be treated with kid gloves, while the peasantry is to be kept in line by fear. That's the POINT of the system. That's WHY it was instituted by the Norman Conquerors. Judicial government by peers of the King was intended as a means of exerting royal power across the realm. And it still is.
Yep. Republican control of the judiciary is what is going to bring Mueller to heel. There are too many McCain/Graham/Bushites in the GOP Congress. They WANT to bring down Trump, and they can always pretend that the Democrats "force" this or that, because they don't WANT a lot of what Trump wants. But judges are monarchs.. One judge in California can stymie the President's immigration plan for a year. And one judge can stop Mueller dead. Supreme Power in America reposes in the judiciary, because the judiciary is the final arbiter of all things.
An artificial convention, mostly in the last 70 years. Nothing in the Constitution makes the judiciary the supreme arbiters of morality or grants them leave to invent constitutional rights out of thin air by fiat. But Mueller certainly drew two rotten cards with that Reagan judge and that Trump judge. They are on his case, big time.
The Constitution means what judges say it means. That has been true since 1802, and it's more true than ever.
You may be right,and I hope you are.
In the entire history of the world,the only nations that had to build walls to keep their own citizens from leaving were those with leftist governments.
#2. To: sneakypete, Vicomte13 (#1)
In other words,it doesn't matter what the law SAYS anymore on any issue with political overtones. What matters is how the judges rule.
#3. To: sneakypete, Tooconservative (#1)
(Edited)
In other words,it doesn't matter what the law SAYS anymore on any issue with political overtones. What matters is how the judges rule.
#4. To: Tooconservative (#2)
Even so, Mueller has run into two judges that were real buzz saws in the last 10 days,
#5. To: Vicomte13 (#4)
Supreme Power in America reposes in the judiciary, because the judiciary is the final arbiter of all things.
#6. To: Tooconservative (#5)
Nothing in the Constitution makes the judiciary the supreme arbiters of morality or grants them leave to invent constitutional rights out of thin air by fiat.
#7. To: Tooconservative (#2)
So I'm not so sure I'd bet against the NRA on this case. They aren't known for filing frivolous cases just for publicity. When they file, they do go for a win. They have a pretty serious legal team.
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