(CBS/AP) Chief Justice Roy Moore was suspended by a judicial ethics panel Friday for his refusal to obey a federal court order to remove his Ten Commandments monument from the Alabama Judicial Building rotunda.This case has brought out some of the most ridiculous arguments in the history of arguing. One argument is that God is everywhere in legal documents ("Year Of Our Lord"), currency, the Declaration of Independence, etc. etc. etc. Therefore, the Ten Commandments have every right to be in the entry of the Alabama Judicial Building.
Moore was automatically suspended with pay when the nine-member Judicial Inquiry Commission referred the ethics complaint against Moore to the Court of the Judiciary, which holds trial-like proceedings and can discipline and remove judges.
No. They don't. It was the work of one man: Judge Roy Moore. Invoking God's name on/in all those other examples is more tradition than absolute law.
I can spend hours about the theological implications here, but the bottom line is that it's Judge Moore's job as a judge to uphold and carry out the law. And if he defies a court order, that makes places him fairly and squarely on the wrong side of the law - which in my opinion, is something judges AREN'T SUPPOSED TO DO!
Wanna build monuments? Fine. Put 'em in your living room since you can't plunk them on public property. Period.
