Originally posted by FlyersFan

Originally posted by RANT
But anyone emotionally involved in this case (not related to
Mrs. Schiavo) is being played for a fool.

RANT. YOU told me that the heart and soul of the left is to take
care of people ... from breathe to death.

"It will be very interesting, because I just can't think of another case that's like this," said Nathaniel Persily, a University of Pennsylvania law professor. "I mean, our guts tell us it's wrong for Congress to try to legislate the result of a particular case, and in general, courts frown on retroactivity and laws that are aimed at selecting out a particular person. But I can't tell you what context a court would use to decide this particular issue, because it's so unusual."

Douglas Laycock, a University of Texas law professor, said there wasn't much ambiguity to the issue.

"Congress is saying no matter how final a matter is, no matter how settled it is in state court, we can tell you to go back and redo it in federal court," he said. "Congress gets to write statutes. It doesn't decide cases, and that's what they seem to be doing here."

The law Congress is set to pass says that the parents of Terri Schiavo, who has been in a vegetative state for 15 years, can go to a federal court to argue that removing her feeding tubes violates her rights under the U.S. Constitution or under federal law.

Congress says the federal court can't consider the many state court judgments that concluded that her husband, as legal guardian, had a right to have her feeding tubes removed. And it can't consider the fact that the Florida Supreme Court has reviewed those state court decisions and concluded that they passed legal muster.

The goal of the legislation is to get Schiavo's parents a full hearing in federal court, and the new law also commands the federal court to provide "injunctive relief" from the state court decisions, which would presumably have Schiavo's feeding tubes re-connected while the federal court proceedings unfold, which could take a year or more.

The legislation raises several questions about Congress' authority, experts say. One is whether it is treading on ground that is reserved exclusively for the judiciary in the Constitution; another is whether it is simply beyond the scope of Congress' own enumerated powers in the Constitution.

There are also questions about whether Congress is improperly blurring the lines between federal and state authority, and whether it is changing a law and applying it retroactively to a case that's already settled.