[Congressional Bills 108th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 4118 Introduced in House (IH)]






108th CONGRESS
  2d Session
                                H. R. 4118

To ensure that the courts interpret the Constitution in the manner that 
                         the Framers intended.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                             April 1, 2004

Mr. Paul (for himself and Mrs. Musgrave) introduced the following bill; 
          which was referred to the Committee on the Judiciary

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
To ensure that the courts interpret the Constitution in the manner that 
                         the Framers intended.

    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 the ``American Justice for Americans 
Citizens Act''.

SEC. 2. FINDINGS.

    The Congress finds the following:
            (1) The Constitution of the United States, Article VI, 
        states that the Constitution shall be the supreme law of the 
        land and that every Senator, Representative, and every 
        executive and judicial officer of the United States and of the 
        several States, shall be bound by oath to faithfully discharge 
        and perform their duties in conformity to the Constitution.
            (2) Although the Framers of the Constitution drew from a 
        wide range of political and legal sources in the drafting of 
        its various provisions, they deliberately designed the 
        Constitution as a unique national instrument to govern the 
        elected and appointed officials of the United States and of the 
        several States and their political subdivisions.
            (3) The Constitution was originally ordained and ratified 
        by the people of the United States so the legislative, 
        executive, and judicial powers of the Federal and State 
        governments would be exercised in accordance with the fixed and 
        enduring principles of the Constitution, as it was ratified by 
        the peoples' representatives in accordance with Article VII of 
        the Constitution, and as stated more than 200 years ago by 
        Chief Justice of the United States John Marshall in Marbury v. 
        Madison.
            (4) Departing from fidelity to the original constitutional 
        text, the Federal judiciary has increasingly disregarded the 
        will of the American people, transforming constitutional 
        principles that were originally designed by the people to be 
        permanent into a set of evolving standards subject to change by 
        judicial opinion, and thereby undermining the American people's 
        right to establish a government according to written 
        constitutional provisions ratified by their elected 
        representatives in constitutional convention.
            (5) The Supreme Court of the United States in Atkins v. 
        Virginia and Lawrence v. Texas found individual 
        ``constitutional'' rights that are directly contrary to the 
        American common-law tradition when it employed a new technique 
        of interpretation called ``transjudicialism'': the reliance by 
        American judges upon foreign judicial and other legal sources 
        outside of American constitutional law.
            (6) Under this new system of ``transjudicialism'' or 
        ``global law'', individual justices of the Supreme Court of the 
        United States have publicly stated they expect American courts 
        to increasingly base their opinions interpreting the 
        Constitution in light of ``international law'' or 
        ``transnational law'', thereby amending the Constitution from 
        an expression of ``We the People of the United States'' to an 
        expression of the will of judges.
            (7) The American people are rightfully entitled to be 
        governed by the Constitution, not as amended by judges through 
        the process of ``transjudicialism'', but as amended by the 
        process set forth in Article V of the Constitution.
            (8) To the end that the amendment process provided for in 
        Article V of the Constitution is preserved, and that the 
        Federal courts exercise only judicial power as vested in them 
        by the people, Congress has the power under Article I, section 
        8, clause 18 and Article III, sections 1 and 2, to regulate the 
        Federal courts.

SEC. 3. INTERPRETATION OF THE CONSTITUTION.

    Neither the Supreme Court of the United States nor any lower 
Federal court shall, in the purported exercise of judicial power to 
interpret and apply the Constitution of the United States, employ the 
constitution, laws, administrative rules, executive orders, directives, 
policies, or judicial decisions of any international organization or 
foreign state, except for the English constitutional and common law or 
other sources of law relied upon by the Framers of the Constitution of 
the United States.
                                 <all>