Gingrich: Prop. 8 Decision Like Dred Scott, Roe v. Wade

Republican presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich ripped into a panel of federal judges that decided on Tuesday in a 2-1 decision on the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals that Proposition 8 -- a measure approved by California votes to recognize only traditional marriage in the Golden State -- was unconstitutional.

With todays decision on marriage by the 9th Circuit, and the likely appeal to the Supreme Court, more and more Americans are being exposed to the radical overreach of federal judges and their continued assault on the Judeo-Christian foundations of the United States, Gingrich said in a statement released on Tuesday. I was drawn back into public life by the 9th Circuits 2002 decision that held that the words under God in the Pledge of Allegiance were unconstitutional. Todays decision is one more example that the American people cannot rest until we restore the proper rule of the judicial branch and bring judges and the courts back under the Constitution.

The Constitution of the United States begins with We the People; it does not begin with We the Judges. Federal judges need to take heed of that fact, Gingrich continued. Federal judges are substituting their own political views for the constitutional right of the people to make judgments about the definition of marriage."

Gingrich went on to compare the decision to the Dred Scott decision and to Roe v. Wade.

The country has been here before. In 1856, the Supreme Court thought it could settle the issue of slavery once and for all and impose a judicial solution on the country. In 1973, the issue was abortion and once again a Supreme Court thought that it could impose a judicial solution on the country once and for all, added Gingrich. Judicial solutions dont solve contentious social issues once and for all. Should the Supreme Court fail to heed the disastrous lessons of its own history and attempt to impose its will on the marriage debate in this country by affirming todays 9th Circuit decision, it will bear the burden of igniting a constitutional crisis of the first order.

The political branches of the federal government, as well as the political branches of the several states, will surely not passively accept the dictates of the federal judiciary on this issue," Gingrich said in conclusion. An interventionist approach by the court on marriage will lead to a crisis of legitimacy for the federal judiciary from which it may take generations to recover.