THE U.S. SENATE MUST HOLD FIRM: OBAMA’S DARLING CHILD, JUDGE MERRICK GARLAND, MUST NOT GAIN JUSTICE SCALIA’S SEAT ON THE U.S. SUPREME COURT

THE U.S. SENATE MUST HOLD FIRM: OBAMA’S DARLING CHILD, JUDGE MERRICK GARLAND, MUST NOT GAIN JUSTICE SCALIA’S SEAT ON THE U.S. SUPREME COURT

Obama is tenacious. His intention to make Judge Merrick Garland a Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court will not let up. If anything, Obama’s efforts to place Judge Garland on the high Court are gathering steam. Obama is continuously thrusting Judge Garland into the limelight.

Obama is well aware that, if the Senate relents and allows a hearing on Judge Garland’s confirmation, Judge Garland is very likely to become a U.S. Supreme Court Justice, replacing the late Justice Antonin Scalia. If that should occur, Obama’s goal of control over the Judiciary will be complete. Obama will be three for three on his Judicial nominees, and the liberal wing of the Judiciary will have a clear majority.

The Democrats would love to see this. That is bad enough. What is worse, two Republican Senators, Mark Kirk of Illinois, and Susan Collins of Maine, have called for a hearing and vote on Obama’s nominee, in defiance of Senate Mitch McConnel’s clear orders to Republican Senators that they hold firm: no hearing on Obama’s nominee, Judge Garland!

Senator Kirk isn’t listening to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnel. But, then, Senator Kirk is a virulent opponent of the Second amendment. That, we know; and Senator Susan Collins views on the Second Amendment are suspect now in light of her support for a hearing and vote on Garland’s nomination to the Supreme Court, in defiance of Senate Majority Leader, Mitch McConnel’s call to Senate Republicans to hold firm.

Hardly a day goes by without Obama thrusting Judge Garland like a dart into the Senate’s eye. And the mainstream media is doing its part as a puppet of the Obama Administration to keep Garland’s name and photo before the public. The New York Times reported, Tuesday, April 12, 2015, in a news article titled, “Senator Grassley and Judge Garland Meet and Rehash the Obvious,” that Judge Garland had an informal meeting over breakfast in the Senate dining room.

Although several other Republican Senators have previously met with Judge Garland and have talked informally with him – and more Republican Senators will likely meet with Judge Garland in the near future – a meeting between Senator Grassley and Judge Garland is especially ominous because Senator Grassley is Chairman of the powerful Senate Judiciary Committee.

Senator Charles Grassley ultimately decides whether a hearing on Obama’s nominee will take place.

For all the fanfare over the finer points of Judge Garland’s intelligence, character, and seemingly benign, pleasant nature, precious little information, if any at all, is available from the mainstream media about Judge Garland’s judicial decisional history. Why is that.

The New York Times reports, in the same April 12, 2016 article, that Judge Garland met with U.S. Senator Patrick J. Toomey, Republican of Pennsylvania. The Senator made this cryptic comment about Garland: “Based on a number of decisions and my conversation with Judge Garland, I’m not convinced that he would be willing to play the role of a sufficiently aggressive check on an administration.”

The “decisions” Senator Toomey is referring to are case law decisions. Senator Toomey did not, unfortunately, elaborate on the point.

How does Judge Garland view the Bill of Rights in light of the decisions he has handed down as United States Court of Appeals Judge for the District of Columbia Circuit? What, specifically, is Judge Garland’s position on the Second Amendment? The President isn’t saying; nor is the Vice President; nor is any Congressman; nor is the mainstream media. We, however, at the Arbalest Quarrel, will do so, as we must.

To address the chasm in reporting on Garland’s decisional case law history the Arbalest Quarrel has taken a look at one particular case that provides a very clear indicator of Judge Garland’s position on the Second Amendment.

In a multi-part series we peer closely at one particular case. The case is National Rifle Association of America, Inc. vs. Reno, 216 F.3d 122, 2000 U.S. App. LEXIS 15906, 342 U.S. App. D.C. 231 (D.C. Cir. 2000).

While the case has been mentioned on several websites, not least of which is Ammoland Shooting Sports News, where the Arbalest Quarrel often posts, there has not been, to our knowledge, a thorough analysis of the case. The Arbalest Quarrel plunges deeply into the mind of Judge Garland. You can see for yourself what we have found. It isn’t pretty.

Make no mistake, if a hearing is held on Obama’s nominee, and votes are cast, and Judge Garland is confirmed as a U.S. Supreme Court Justice, Justice Scalia’s legacy, as a staunch defender of the Second Amendment, will be systematically eroded. The two seminal Second Amendment cases, District of Columbia vs. Heller, 554 U.S. 570; 128 S. Ct. 2783; 171 L. Ed. 2d 637; 2008 U.S. LEXIS 5268 (2008) and McDonald vs. City of Chicago, 561 U.S. 742; 130 S. Ct. 3020; 177 L. Ed. 2d 894; 2010 U.S. LEXIS 5523 (2010), will either be overturned outright or whittled away to the point they cease to have legal significance. That means that four lone Justices, who comprise the conservative wing of the Court, will be unable to stop the coming onslaught wrought by the antigun establishment. The endgame – complete destruction of the Second Amendment – would be, then, just a matter of time.