{"id":6026,"date":"2010-07-09T01:28:32","date_gmt":"2010-07-09T05:28:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/?p=6026"},"modified":"2010-07-09T01:28:32","modified_gmt":"2010-07-09T05:28:32","slug":"thomas-concurs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/6026\/thomas-concurs\/","title":{"rendered":"Thomas Concurs"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Any reader familiar with Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia knows his professional reputation is etched with the cuts of (seemingly) a thousand harshly worded dissents.\u00a0 In fact, they are so clear and compelling there\u2019s a book called <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Scalia-Dissents-Writings-Wittiest-Outspoken\/dp\/0895260530 \" target=\"_blank\"><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Scalia Dissents<\/span><\/a> that catalogues some of his most pointed opinions.<\/p>\n<p>Justice Clarence Thomas takes a different approach.\u00a0 His most intriguing opinions usually come in the form of concurrences, agreeing with the conservative majority\u2019s result, but not its process.\u00a0 The most recent example was his unchallenged concurrence to the Chicago gun rights case (<a href=\"http:\/\/www.supremecourt.gov\/opinions\/09pdf\/08-1521.pdf \" target=\"_blank\"><em>McDonald v. City of Chicago<\/em><\/a>).\u00a0 In it, the Court\u2019s clearest thinking \u2013 and best writing \u2013 justice observed that \u201cdue process\u201d of the 14<sup>th<\/sup> Amendment guarantees nothing more than the process due a person before taking his life, liberty or property.<\/p>\n<p>In other words, the government can deprive a person of any one or all three, it just needs to establish a scheme for doing so.<\/p>\n<p>Thus, if it\u2019s true that there are certain fundamental rights \u2013 like the 2<sup>nd<\/sup> Amendment\u2019s guarantee to carry a weapon for self-defense \u2013 that cannot be infringed by states and localities, conservatives and liberals will have to look somewhere other than the due process clause to protect them. Justice Thomas found the mechanism in the 14 Amendment\u2019s privileges or immunities clause.\u00a0 Not only does it fit with the intent of the amendment\u2019s framers, it boasts the honor of <a href=\"http:\/\/article.nationalreview.com\/437748\/thomass-principled-jurisprudence-in-arms-case\/michael-barone \" target=\"_blank\">not confusing the process of depriving rights with the substance of those rights<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>All lawyers should strive to be so helpful.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Any reader familiar with Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia knows his professional reputation is etched with the cuts of (seemingly) a thousand harshly worded dissents.\u00a0 In fact, they are so clear and compelling there\u2019s a book called Scalia Dissents that catalogues some of his most pointed opinions. Justice Clarence Thomas takes a different approach.\u00a0 His [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[285,1494,1496,1525,221,220,92],"class_list":["post-6026","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-posts","tag-antonin-scalia","tag-clarence-thomas","tag-fourteenth-amendment","tag-fundamental-right","tag-mcdonald-v-city-of-chicago","tag-second-amendment","tag-supreme-court"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6026","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6026"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6026\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6028,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6026\/revisions\/6028"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6026"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6026"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6026"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}