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Well, maybe the end of the world is coming after all, if you’re the law-and-order type in California. The Supreme Court has ordered the release of up to 46,000 inmates because of prison overcrowding:
Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, speaking for the majority, said California’s prisons had "fallen short of minimum constitutional requirements" because of overcrowding. As many as 200 prisoners may live in gymnasium, he said, and as many as 54 prisoners share a single toilet.
Kennedy insisted that the state had no choice but to release more prisoners. The justices, however, agreed that California officials should be given more time to make the needed reductions.
In dissent, Justice Antonin Scalia called the ruling "staggering" and "absurd."
He said the high court had repeatedly overruled the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals for ordering the release of individual prisoners. Now, he said, the majority were ordering the release of "46,000 happy-go-lucky felons." He added that "terrible things are sure to happen as a consequence of this outrageous order." Justice Clarence Thomas agreed with him.
David Savage writes this story at the Los Angeles Times: Link (Photo: Gary Friedman/LA Times)
The Zoopreme Court is a collection of animal caricatures of U.S. Supreme Court justices. Dan Schofield and Alice DuBois, the site’s creators, select animals with puns based on the names of each justice. Pictured above is Ruth Bearder Ginsbearg (Ruth Bader Ginsburg). Schofield and DuBois plan to compose caricatures of all 112 justices as well as landmark decisions.
Link via The Agitator
In the not-too-distant past, it was against the law in many states for people of different races to marry. Richard and Mildred Loving got married in Washington, DC in 1958 and returned to their hometown in Virginia as criminals.
When they went to trial, the judge found them guilty and sentenced them to a jail term of one to three years. However, the judge told the Lovings that he would suspend the sentence if they agreed to leave Virginia for a period of twenty five years. Given the choice between imprisonment and banishment, they chose banishment. The Lovings moved to Washington, DC.
The Lovings filed a suit challenging the law. After a nine-year battle, on June 12, 1967, the US Supreme Court handed down a decision in the case of Loving vs. Virginia that did away with the remaining miscegenation laws. The Loving Day project promotes the celebration of this milestone on or around June 12th. Link -via Drug Monkey
