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Oct. 2nd, 2008
Supreme Court Case Meme
Oct. 2nd, 2008 08:00 amThis is popping up all over my friends list; ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
demiurgent and liralen (happy birthday, by the way!) were the first places I saw it.
The Meme: As evidenced by Katie Couric, Sarah Palin is unable to name any Supreme Court Case other than Roe v. Wade.
The Rules: Post info about ONE Supreme Court decision, modern or historic, to your lj. (Any decision, as long as it's not Roe v. Wade.) For those who see this on your f-list, take the meme to your OWN lj to spread the fun.
The first case that came to mind, off the top of my head (after all, it would have been cheating to look one up), was Dred Scott vs. Sandford (1857), one of the great miscarriages of justice in the 19th century—which happened to start, legally speaking, in my home state of Missouri. We all learn about it in junior high/high school history class here in the USA; it was one of the events that led up to the American Civil War. Dred Scott, a slave, was hauled all over the country by his master—including through free states where slavery was illegal. Eventually, once they were back in slave states, Scott tried to buy his freedom, was rejected, and finally sued for it.
After lower court rulings in his favor, the Supreme Court ruled that slaves couldn't be citizens, African-Americans were "beings of an inferior order," and the Missouri Compromise was not constitutional. Therefore, Scott remained a slave.
I always wondered, learning about it in school, how many times Scott must have kicked himself for not just walking away when he had the chance, while living in a state where slavery was illegal.
Things I don't remember learning in school are that by the time the trial was over, John Sanford (whose name was misspelled by the Supreme Court in the decision!) had been declared insane and committed, and the children of a former owner purchased Scott's freedom a couple of months after the Supreme Court decision. He didn't have long to enjoy it, however—he died six months later of tuberculosis.
The decision was directly overturned by the "Slaughter-house cases" in 1873, which actually just noted that the 14th Amendment had already overturned it.
Writing about this entry caused me to consider something that I hadn't thought about in a while. In the history classes I took in high school, I remember learning all about when and how slavery ended in the USA, but nothing about how it ended in the rest of the world. In fact, I still only have the vaguest idea. I should research that sometime, or at least look it up in Wikipedia.
demiurgent and liralen (happy birthday, by the way!) were the first places I saw it.The Meme: As evidenced by Katie Couric, Sarah Palin is unable to name any Supreme Court Case other than Roe v. Wade.
The Rules: Post info about ONE Supreme Court decision, modern or historic, to your lj. (Any decision, as long as it's not Roe v. Wade.) For those who see this on your f-list, take the meme to your OWN lj to spread the fun.
The first case that came to mind, off the top of my head (after all, it would have been cheating to look one up), was Dred Scott vs. Sandford (1857), one of the great miscarriages of justice in the 19th century—which happened to start, legally speaking, in my home state of Missouri. We all learn about it in junior high/high school history class here in the USA; it was one of the events that led up to the American Civil War. Dred Scott, a slave, was hauled all over the country by his master—including through free states where slavery was illegal. Eventually, once they were back in slave states, Scott tried to buy his freedom, was rejected, and finally sued for it.
After lower court rulings in his favor, the Supreme Court ruled that slaves couldn't be citizens, African-Americans were "beings of an inferior order," and the Missouri Compromise was not constitutional. Therefore, Scott remained a slave.
I always wondered, learning about it in school, how many times Scott must have kicked himself for not just walking away when he had the chance, while living in a state where slavery was illegal.
Things I don't remember learning in school are that by the time the trial was over, John Sanford (whose name was misspelled by the Supreme Court in the decision!) had been declared insane and committed, and the children of a former owner purchased Scott's freedom a couple of months after the Supreme Court decision. He didn't have long to enjoy it, however—he died six months later of tuberculosis.
The decision was directly overturned by the "Slaughter-house cases" in 1873, which actually just noted that the 14th Amendment had already overturned it.
Writing about this entry caused me to consider something that I hadn't thought about in a while. In the history classes I took in high school, I remember learning all about when and how slavery ended in the USA, but nothing about how it ended in the rest of the world. In fact, I still only have the vaguest idea. I should research that sometime, or at least look it up in Wikipedia.
How Best to make the "Palin Comparison"
Oct. 2nd, 2008 07:40 pmIf you have access to it and are planning to watch the debate tonight, BoingBoing points out that CSpan is the best place to watch it since they do the constant split-screen thing so you can watch both candidates at once and see how each reacts to what the other one says.
It'll be interesting watching the debate tonight. I wonder if Palin will self-destruct, or if the whole self-destructing-on-interviews thing is a schtick to lower expectations so that she'll be able to "win" the debate by, basically, not going to pieces?
It'll be interesting watching the debate tonight. I wonder if Palin will self-destruct, or if the whole self-destructing-on-interviews thing is a schtick to lower expectations so that she'll be able to "win" the debate by, basically, not going to pieces?