I suppose this means Luttig is now off the "short list"

[JMHACLJ at aol.com]

In a message dated 12/21/2005 11:53:50 P.M. Eastern Standard Time,  
zimmermi at shu.edu writes:

With  Judge Robinson bailing on the
FISA court, there is an emerging pattern that  the federal court system has
had enough from this  administration.
Well, one does not often have the chance to quote Robert Byrd with a  
straight face.  But if the "federal court system" whatever that is, "has  had enough 
from this administration" then Fie on them!
 
Judges are in place under the Constitution, it had seemed to me, only to  
determine, in actual cases and controversies, the issues presented to them in  
such cases.  While there are many politicians in the judicial ranks,  they are 
not in charge of policy, either foreign or domestic.  If they feel  that they 
have been ill-used, then, in the course of deciding actual cases and  
controversies and without doing harm to the constitutional order, let them do  what the 
law and the Constitution require of them.
 
I vow, if I am ever put in charge of drafting a federal constitutional  
provision in this area, judges will be barred from issuing opinions in writing,  
from cabal behavior in backrooms, from scheming in the study.  They'll  sit on 
the bench, hear the argument, ask the questions, and  announce judgments and 
rulings from the bench.  No precedential value  will be permitted to be accorded 
in any subsequent litigation (perhaps excepting  those cases in which true 
collateral estoppel or res judicata principles apply)  to a former decision of a 
court.
 
Jim Henderson
Senior Counsel
ACLJ
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