PROTEST REHNQUIST’S 50 YEARS OF UNDERMINING DEMOCRACY & EQUAL OPPORTUNITY

 

Friday May.  24, by 3:00pm meet outside Shorewood High School, by the Oakland Ave. parking lot, just south of Capital Drive.

 

When five members of the Rehnquist Supreme Court stopped the 2000 Presidential vote count & selected Bush as president, they undermined “the nation’s confidence in the judge as an impartial guardian of the rule of law,” according to moderate Republican Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens. These five acted as “political partisans, not of judges of a court of law,” according to 673 Law Professors.

 

The “Rehnquist Five” selected Bush as president on Equal Protection on grounds that the same Court barely a week earlier found was unworthy of consideration. Their holding contradicted their own record of denying relief to historic victims of discrimination, based on a narrow view of constitutional injury & standing.

 

Rehnquist had a long prior record of hostility to voting rights on & off the Court. This included his role in “OPERATION EAGLE EYE,” to stall voting in Hispanic & African-American areas, by demanding already registered voters answer irrelevant questions and read the Constitution to GOP lawyers.

 

Rehnquist campaigned against protecting citizens of color from overt racial discrimination, on & off the bench:

 

He actively opposed a law in Phoenix outlawing racial discrimination by stores and restaurants.

 

As a Supreme Court law clerk, he wrote that the U.S. Supreme Court should “re-affirm” the racist Plessy v. Ferguson decision, which had upheld the constitutionality of overt “Jim Crow”racial segregation

 

He drafted a proposed constitutional amendment to bar court action & busing to remedy school segregation.

 

On the court, he had been anti-labor, hostile to victims of proven police misconduct, and voted to overturn Roe v. Wade, which protects women’s rights to choose.

 

Rehnquist ‘s attempt to deny his personal involvement and responsibility for some of his actions and writings, has been disputed by numerous eyewitnesses and court historians. 

 

For more info, including citations and what you can do to help, http://www.geocities.com/justice_watch/ [note: you need to type in the underscore between justice_watch] or call Milw NLG, (414) 273-1040.

Ad Hoc Coalition Protesting Rehnquist Award, including Shorewood High School students; the National Lawyers Guild – Milwaukee; National Organization for Women - Milwaukee; the Federation for Civic Action; Peace Action – WI; Voter March, WI Chapter; Greater Milwaukee Green Party; Wisconsin Committee for Peace & Justice;  the Angela Davis CopWatch & others