Stupid Judge Tricks

An excellent piece by Jay Greene ripping the Florida Supreme Court's recent decision.

The basis on which they did choose to strike down the voucher program was lacking in textual support and logical consistency The Florida voucher ruling reveals that judges need not be guardians of logic, but can simply be political actors pursuing desired policy outcomes. Can't we just cut out the middleman and ask judges to formulate policy without having these pesky legislatures?

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January 11, 2006, 8:09 a.m.
Stupid Judge Tricks
Choosing to kill school choice.

By Jay P. Greene & Marcus A. Winters

National Review

http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/greene_winters200601110809.asp

We had always heard complaints about outrageous judicial activism, where judges essentially operate as lawmakers, inventing convoluted legal rationalizations to produce their preferred policy outcome. But not until the Florida supreme court struck down one of the state's school-voucher programs on a strictly party-line vote last week did we see up close just how outrageous judicial activism can be. Let this be a warning to all of those who, like ourselves, doubted the dangers of judicial activism; the law is whatever a group of people in robes say it is, even if what they say makes no sense.

The Florida court offered three arguments for striking down the Opportunity Scholarship program, which provided vouchers to students at chronically failing public schools with which they could attend a private school. All three involve interpretations of the state constitutional requirement that Florida provide "by law for a uniform, efficient, safe, secure, and high quality system of free public schools that allows students to obtain a high quality education."...