Where in the world is Marci Hamilton?

Yesterday, “internationally recognized constitutional law expert” Marci Hamilton was talking big about how wrong the Texas Third Court of Appeal was to (unanimously) put Judge Barbara Walther in her place for creating the FLDS debacle. Today, Marci’s been strangely silent. Yesterday. Today. What a difference a day makes. Where is Marci?? In her absence, let’s take a quick whack at part of Marci’s column from yesterday. She wrote:

They [the FLDS parents] presented their dubious challenge as a petition for a writ of mandamus – an extraordinary remedy that is only rarely granted. Yet the [Third Court of Appeals unanimously] ruled in favor of the women, and against the Texas child protection authorities.

That [unanimous] decision was not just wrong, but wrongheaded – for it applied the opposite approach to questions involving child abuse and religious entities than it should have: the court focused on religious belief while downplaying the actual conduct at issue [but not in evidence]. Fortunately, the state is now appealing to the Texas Supreme Court, and rightly so.

Hmm. Marci? What gives? Now, the Texas Supreme Court has ruled (unanimously as to boys and pre-pubescent girls and 6-3 as to all the children) that Marci, Walther and CPS were up in the night. 6-3 is the election-day equivalent of 67-33, a landslide. Why? What did Professor Hamilton miss? Just the facts, M’am. The key word is conduct.

The Supreme Court ruled that CPS had not only not proven but had not alleged any conduct by the parents that endangered the kids to the extent required to remove them from their homes. Conduct. It was that simple. Should have been obvious to a constitutional savant like Prof. Hamilton. Why wasn’t it? I think it’s because Prof. Hamilton has an agenda. Hint: Read this piece of Marci’s on Mitt Romney.

Are the FLDS Marci’s Mormon voodoo doll? Are the Mormons her only target? We’ll address this question in more detail in a later post, but the big-picture answer in my mind is that Hamilton has it in for men and what she styles “hierarchical” religion generally (but especially Catholics and Mormons). She may herself be an abuse victim.

Whatever drives Marci, she broadcasts a hard means-end ethic that says its OK to put all kinds of innocent men and their families through hell just to root out and punish (through the legal system) those instances of abuse that fall through the cracks. She views prison terms (and perhaps even the death penalty) as the best way to cure America’s obsession with sex. I think she should take a closer look, figuratively speaking, at pornography. Eliminate that beast and sex abuse will decline dramatically.

By the way, on Paterrico’s website, you’ll find a probable instance of perjury by the central CPS investigator, Angie Voss. She states under oath that in all 19 of the residences, CPS found an underaged, pregnant girl:

The parents’ attorney asking questions says CPS is taking a “one-size-fits-all, cookie-cutter approach” to the case, and it’s not fair for CPS to take more than 400 children away based on global allegations.

“Up to this point in the investigation, there are over 20 girls in the investigation who have conceived or given birth at the age of 16 or 17,” Voss says. “What I’m telling you is that there is a culture of young girls being pregnant by old men.”

So there was a girl like that in all 19 residences on the ranch?
“Yes, sir, there was,” Voss says.

It is now widely acknowledged that no more (and probably less) than five females at the ranch were both pregnant and underaged.