The relatively unimportant judicial action over CNN reporter Jim Acosta’s press credentials passed without notice of its truly vital issue.
Putting aside politics, parties you may prefer or presidents you love or hate, a lawyer sitting on a bench simply decided what another branch of government could do.
The White House can hold news conferences or not as it chooses. Invitations (“credentials” are merely an administrative convenience) are its own concern and do not even involve law or rights. No court in the land has any business ordering around of another branch of government. The appropriate response to CNN’s lawsuit would have been “This is an executive branch matter and none of the judiciary’s concern. Filing dismissed.”
There are some 657 federal district courts where court-shopping has long facilitated reliance on the calamitous 1803 Marbury v. Madison ruling as an excuse to justify unconstitutional judicial interference. Lawyers scream “independent” judiciary, but what they really mean is supreme and unaccountable judiciary. To even dream that the Founding Fathers envisioned “their nine supreme majesties,” let alone 675 other single lawyers or various appellate courts, monarchically ruling the other branches, is patently absurd.
The concept is a time bomb portending a future constitutional crisis.
Paul Sharp, Salt Lake City
