Constitutional Law

Guardian Columnist Says Judge Hamilton Unfairly Maligned

The Guardian's Michael Tomasky, in an April 21 column, takes to task critics of President Obama's federal appeals court nominee Judge David F. Hamilton. Specifically Tomasky looks into how opponents of the nomination, such as former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, perpetuate the claim that Hamilton wrote in a 2005 federal court decision that Indiana legislators cannot cite Jesus Christ in legislative prayers, but can cite Allah.

Tomasky writes:

I Googled around, and sure enough, a search returned thousands of rabid posts from the wing-o-sphere about this judge who thinks Indianans should be allowed to pray to Allah but not the Jesus.

I had to slog my way through about four or five pages of this nonsense on the returned results, but eventually I found my way to the actual case, and I went and looked up Hamilton's actual decision. The case is captioned Hinrichs v Bosma. It was decided 30 November 2005, and you can read the 60-page decision in pdf form here.

 

Naturally, it's all a lie, but as I said, even I was shocked at how rancidly despicable a lie it was.

Tomasky says of Hamilton's decision invalidating Indiana's use of prayer during its legislative sessions:

Interestingly, he [Hamilton] relies on two decisions from the fourth judicial circuit to lay out his argument. Why is it interesting? Because the fourth circuit, based in Virginia, is the country's most conservative.

 

The fourth circuit heard a case called Wynn v Town of Great Falls. The town council opened its meetings with a prayer that regularly mentioned Jesus Christ. The fourth circuit – remember, the country's most conservative – ruled that Great Falls stood in clear violation of the establishment clause, and that the prayer ‘promoted one religion over all others'.

 

Not only did Hamilton rely on the country's most conservative federal circuit court, he specifically cited an opinion written by one of the most conservative jurists on that court. Judge J Harvie Wilkinson is always on the short list when a US supreme court seat opens up during a Republican presidency. But even Wilkinson wrote, as Hamilton quotes him:

We cannot adopt a view of the tradition of legislative prayer that chops up American citizens on public occasions into representatives of one sect and one sect only, whether Christian, Jewish or Wiccan. In private observances, the faithful surely choose to express the unique aspects of their creeds. But in their civic faith, Americans have reached more broadly. Our civic faith seeks guidance that is not the property of any sect.

Hat tip goes to alicublog on noting Tomasky's column.   

Full post as published by ACS Blog on April 22, 2009 (boomark / email).