A BILL
To limit the jurisdiction of the Federal courts, and for other
purposes.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United
States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as `We the People Act'.
SEC. 2. FINDINGS.
The Congress finds the following:
(1) Article III, section 1 of the Constitution of the United
States vests the judicial power of the United States in `one Supreme
Court, and in such inferior Courts as Congress may from time to time
ordain and establish'.
(2) Article I, section 8 and article 3, section 1 of the
Constitution of the United States give Congress the power to establish
and limit the jurisdiction of the lower Federal courts.
(3) Article III, section 2 of the Constitution of the United
States gives Congress the power to make `such exceptions, and under such
regulations' as Congress finds necessary to Supreme Court jurisdiction.
(4) Congress has the authority to make exceptions to Supreme
Court jurisdiction in the form of general rules and based upon policy
and constitutional reasons other than the outcomes of a particular line
of cases. (See Federalist No. 81; United States v. Klein, 80 U.S. (13
Wall.) 128 (1872)).
(5) Congress has constitutional authority to set broad limits on
the jurisdiction of both the Supreme Court and the lower Federal courts
in order to correct abuses of judicial power and continuing violations
of the Constitution of the United States by Federal courts.
(6) Article IV, section 4 of the Constitution of the United
States guarantees each State a republican form of government.
(7) Supreme Court and lower Federal court decisions striking down
local laws on subjects such as religious liberty, sexual orientation,
family relations, education, and abortion have wrested from State and
local governments issues reserved to the States and the People by the
Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States.
(8) The Supreme Court and lower Federal courts threaten the
republican government of the individual States by replacing elected
government with rule by unelected judges.
(9) Even supporters of liberalized abortion laws have admitted
that the Supreme Court's decisions overturning the abortion laws of all
50 States are constitutionally flawed (e.g. Ely, `The Wages of Crying
Wolf: A Comment on Roe v. Wade' 82 Yale L.J. 920 (1973)).
(10) Several members of the Supreme Court have admitted that the
Court's Establishment Clause jurisdiction is indefensible (e.g. Zelamn
v. Simmons-Harris, 536 U.S. 639, 688 (2002) (Souter, J., dissenting);
Rosenberger v. Rector and Visitors of the Univ. of Va., 515 U.S. 819,
861 (1995) (Thomas, J. concurring); Lamb's Chapel v. Center Moriches
Union Free Sch. Dist., 508 U.S. 384, 399, (1993) (Scalia, J.
concurring); and Committee for Public Ed. And Religious Liberty v.
Regan, 444 U.S. 646, 671 (1980) (Stevens, J., dissenting).
(11) Congress has the responsibility to protect the republican
governments of the States and has the power to limit the jurisdiction of
the Supreme Court and the lower Federal courts over matters that are
reserved to the States and to the People by the Tenth Amendment to the
Constitution of the United States.