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Comment by Ajedi32 | Hacker News Reader

I agree with most of what you said, but I disagree with this:

> If your definition of "activist" is strengthening individual rights and refusing to give power to the federal government and its giant bureaucracy then I guess I'm OK with an "activist" Supreme Court.

Activism is activism regardless of whether it "strengthens individual rights" or not. It would be ridiculous to argue Roe vs. Wade wasn't activist just because it "strengthened individual rights". What rights? Rights according to whom? You could justify pretty much any decision this way.

I'm not familiar with the details of the case in Citizen's United, but whether or not it constitutes activism depends not on the effects of the decision, but the reasoning by which it was reached.

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Yes, the reasoning is definitely the problem with a lot of recent decisions. One thing that stands out in my mind is the majority opinion in the prayers in school case that stated that part of their reasoning to rule in favor of the coach praying was that he was doing so in private and players could voluntarily join him. When, as noted by the descent, the case itself included photographs of said coach, kneeling in prayer with his team at center court.

> Activism is activism regardless of whether it "strengthens individual rights" or not

My comment wasn't very clear, but I was trying to communicate that recognizing that the Constitution is centered around the idea of a limited federal government with explicit powers is not evidence of inappropriate "activism". Instead it is evidence of appropriate checks on federal overreach.

I don't know what to make of your statement "activism is activism". To be a useful term, "activism" needs to mean something other than "doing something" or "doing something that I disagree with".

My definition of judicial activism would be ruling in a biased manner to get a politically desired result rather than solely on the basis of the facts and the law as written.

You can rule in a biased manner in favor or individual freedom or against it. My point is that that's not relevant to the definition.

I do agree with you however that the current U.S. constitution is centered around the idea of a limited federal government with enumerated powers and that therefore an unbiased interpretation of the constitution as written will tend to result in rulings that support individual freedom in general, though that's not a hard and fast rule.

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