Republican Wants to Bring Back America's Favorite Past: Slavery!

[evildevil]

Republican Will Reluctantly Vote to Bring Back Slavery If that is What the Public Wants.

Nev. Assemblyman Jim Wheeler responds to firestorm over slavery commentA Nevada assemblyman has faced tough scrutiny after he said in a YouTube video posted this week that he would vote in favor of slavery if it was in line with his constituents’ wishes

Comments

Does this Assemblyman have any basic education in law, legal theory or political science?

[kleios_kiss]

I think the point that he so horribly misses is that he doesn't understand what a democracy is, nor how ours is conducted. All he would need to do is listen to recent Supreme Court rulings to understand what is in the jurisdiction of voters to decide upon (I believe this tactic was used in overruling Prop 8).

In short - voters do not have a right to vote for something that would deny rights to others. I'm sure there are legal exceptions depending on how courts and legislatures define "rights" (see: abortion debates and gun debates), but democracies are generally governments that rank high on the list of forms of government that protect basic human rights, which includes personal integrity. A "democratic election" to remove rights is a contradiction in terms - you cannot vote to take away another person's rights to freedom or wages any more than you can vote to imprison a person without a trial or imprison them without explaining their charges.

By violating the rights of others, you are excluding those others from "democracy."

[evaporate]

The Supreme Court didn't overrule Prop 8. They didn't rule on any substantive issue in the case, only that petitioners didn't have standing to defend the measure in court. All they did was say "nope can't rule on this, and neither could the Ninth Circuit, natch, so whatever the federal trial court judge said stands!" which happened to have the effect of overruling Prop 8. I don't recall Judge Walker's reasoning but whatever it was SCOTUS didn't adopt it in the least... I mean, wish it had, but Hollingsworth ended in a draw. SCOTUS also doesn't generally rule on things that voters can or cannot vote for so much as things the government can or cannot regulate or enforce

[moonshaz]

Agreed with all of this, especially the dumbass part.

[alryssa]

#rebranding

[crossfire]

A+

[silver_apples]

Even ignoring the slavery part, nothing he said was good. "I would do anything you wanted if you threatened to kill me if I didn't" is not proof of putting other people's wishes and values above your own. But we all know he did not really mean a literal gun, no matter what he said later, he meant he'd vote for slavery if they threatened to vote him out of office if he didn't. What he values most is his job and power.

[amyura]

Actually, no, we don't have direct vote-on-everything, majority-rules democracy. So no elected official is obligated to govern by polling. I'm not sure, but I do believe ALL elected officials have to swear to abide by the constitution. Maybe not at the municipal level, but certainly at the federal level.