What Do You Think?

[troach]

Assuming this statement of the story is true.

Congress passed a law in 2002, one month before Menachem was born, ordering the State Department to record Jerusalem, Israel on birth certificates if such a request is made.

There should not even be an issue to take to the courts, just do what congress has instructed. Or is the state department saying they are above the law and can do what they want regardless of what laws congress makes?

Of course as the article also stated:

The State Department has stood by its claim that the issue is a matter of policy as such, is under the jurisdiction of the Executive Branch.

But regardless of what branch they fall under, guess what, they need to follow laws that are passed by the legislative branch of government. Like it or not even the president has to follow and obey the law.

Unless of course we want to say our democracy is dead (or quickly dieing) and we are moving into a dictator / authoritative form of government.

Though with what I am seeing it seem more and more likely that the once great country we knew and loved is being torn apart by the government and its agencies to what in years to come will be little more than a foot note in history.

It may not be much of a victory to change the direction the government is going. But I really hope the courts rule in favor of the parents and remind the state department that while they may get instructions of what to do from the president, they still have to follow the all the laws not just the ones they want to when they want to.

This seems like such a trivial case. A matter of what to put on the Consular Report of Birth Abroad the place of birth should it say Israel or Jerusalem, Israel. (Consular Report of Birth Abroad is the state department's "foreign birth certificate" that is required by the US government to show that that the child of an American citizen is really an American citizen.)

But the ramifications of this case are extremely far reaching if the parents loose it opens an even bigger door for the state department to do what they want. In essence allowing the state department to totally ignore any and all laws that they do not like while at the same time enforcing the laws on everyone else.

Yes this is a political case but this case opens some really huge not so political issues regarding potential abuse of power and corruption with agencies that already seem at times to be out of control.


copied from:
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/143900


by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu
Follow Israel news on Twitter and Facebook.

The U.S. Supreme Court will hear an appeal by an American couple that their eight-year old son Menachem’s birthplace be recorded as Jerusalem, Israel. The court only accepts approximately 100 cases a year.

Unlike the judicial system in Israel, the American Supreme Court does not act as a court of appeal except n cases that involve a question of whether the law has been interpreted properly.

The State Department has refused a request by Ari and Naomi Sideman Zivotofsky, whose appeal was rejected by a federal court on the grounds that their complaint involved a “political question" that is not to be decided judicially.

Congress passed a law in 2002, one month before Menachem was born, ordering the State Department to record Jerusalem, Israel on birth certificates if such a request is made. The State Department has stood by its claim that the issue is a matter of policy as such, is under the jurisdiction of the Executive Branch.

The federal court ruled, "That the United States expresses no official view on the thorny issue of whether Jerusalem is part of Israel has been a central and calibrated feature of every president's foreign policy since Harry S. Truman.

"Because the judiciary has no authority to order the Executive Branch to change the nation's foreign policy in this matter, this case is unquestionably under the political question doctrine."

The Supreme Court judges told the Zivotofskys and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to reply whether the Foreign Relations Authorization Act “impermissibly infringes upon the President's power to recognize foreign sovereigns."

The United States has maintained a policy of listing only the country “Israel” and not the city, no matter which one, as a birthplace for Americans. The case of Jerusalem is particularly sensitive. After the Six-Day War in 1967, the United States and all other countries pulled their embassies out of the city in order not to indicate to Arabs a recognition of Israeli sovereignty.