Schneller v. Cortes: Motion Denied, Writ Dismissed – with Opinion
According to the Supreme Court’s Docket (see the Order here), James Schneller, Plaintiff pro se in Schneller v. Cortes, had his motion for leave to proceed in forma pauperis denied and the petition for a writ of Certioriari dismissed in the first opinionated order given by the Supreme Court in any eligibility case submitted to the Justices for consideration:
The motion of petitioner for leave to proceed in forma pauperis is denied, and the petition for a writ of certiorari is dismissed. See Rule 39.8. As the petitioner has repeatedly abused this Court’s process, the Clerk is directed not to accept any further petitions in noncriminal matters from petitioner unless the docketing fee required by Rule 38(a) is paid and the petition is submitted in compliance with Rule 33.1. See Martin v. District of Columbia Court of Appeals, 506 U.S. 1 (1992) (per curiam). Justice Stevens dissents. See id., at 4, and cases cited therein.
Most observers will understand that the Court dismissing the petition for Certiorari simply means that the Supreme Court (1) does not wish to hear this case for whatever reason and that (2) the lower Court’s decision is binding. The “in forma pauperis” legal term basically means that the petitioner is asking to be able to proceed forward with this case by paying as few Court costs as possible.
In fact, according to the linked Wikipedia, these kinds of requests are hardly rare at the Supreme Court level…
Approximately two-thirds of writ of certiorari petitions to the Supreme Court are filed in forma pauperis.[2][3] Most of those petitioners are prisoners.[2] Petitions that appear on the Supreme Court’s in forma pauperis docket are substantially less likely to be granted review than those on the paid docket.[4]
IFP status is usually granted in connection to pro se petitioners, but the two concepts are separate and distinct.
This could very well have been the reason why Associate Justice Stevens dissented from the majority opinion. Basically, the Court’s majority opinion is that Mr. Schneller is not to submit anything further to the Court — and the Clerk’s Office is to ignore — concerning civil (noncriminal) matters unless the appropriate fees are paid.
Let this be a lesson to those who wish to pursue eligibility at the Supreme Court: be prepared to pay any and all fees required by the Court!
See the following links regarding the eligibility saga:
- Obama’s Presidential Eligibility: What You Need to Know
- Obama’s Sealed Background Documentation
- Obama Citizenship Facts
- Sen. Patrick Leahy’s (D-VT) Natural Born Citizen Resolution (April 10, 2008)
- Citizen Grand Jury Updates and Eligibility Lawsuit Listing
-Phil
bob strauss says:
June 30, 2009 at 10:33 am
earl, many congressmen objected against Bush.
As far as I can tell, no objection was raised in 2001, except at the beginning of the proceeding. Al Gore told the Congressman who was trying to get something in the record about the vote that he was out of order and stated the parliamentary rule that was being broken. In 2005, Stephanie Jones of Ohio and Sen Barbara Boxer of California objected to the Ohio vote, but not to Bush. After discussion, the objection was defeated and the vote count moved on. As far as the documentation I have found, Al Gore called for objection after tally for each state in 2001. Neither in 2005 nor 2009 did Cheney call for objection.
I posted links to the transcripts for 2001 ( CNN talking over the vote) and 2005 on the Kerchner v. Obama thread pending gracious approval by Phil. Check it out and see what you think.
brygenon,
I frankly expect the negativity from the cable news channels. I, however, didn’t expect that she and her producer(s) got most of the generalities of the eligibility controversy correct; I filled in the specifics with my numerous links under the video in the posting.
-Phil
Phil wrote:
Ah, I see — of course your “best-of” article was familiar material to a dedicated o-bot such as myself, so I just skimmed it.
We discussed this piece before, right? You caught that she used von Brunn to paint birthers in general as dangerous, but missed that she used the birthers to paint the right wing in general as stupid.
I love Rachel Maddow, but I have to admit she’s not exactly fair and balanced.
earl, many congressmen objected against Bush.
Here are the proceedings from Jan 6, 2001 from CSPAN. It’s 90 minutes long and I haven’t been able to get it to play. Maybe someone will have better luck and can report if Al Gore called for objections.
http://cspan.org/Watch/Media/2001/01/07/HP/A/53/Entire+Program.aspx
brygenon,
Apparently you missed by “best-of” vacation posting that was a Headliner here on my blog. In that posting, I featured the following video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jhuPw5WCO0A
-Phil
Phil wrote:
I don’t know specifically what report you are talking about. In general, I don’t see the mainstream media doing stories about problems with President Obama’s eligibility, though they are occasionally doing stories about kooks. http://www.obamaconspiracy.org/media/
“Based solely on the docket entry…”
Phil-
You read it wrong. Souter didn’t dissent in the Schneller v. Cortes case. There is no dissenting opinion for cases in conference. The note is pointing Schneller to something in Souter’s dissenting opinion in Martin v District of Columbia. Maybe some eager legal eagle will look it up.
Several previous comments show some confusion over Justice Stevens’ dissent. There’s no mystery about it. His cited dissent, from 1992, begins, “In my opinion the judicial resources of the court could be used more effectively by simply denying Martin’s petitions than by drafting, entering, and policing the order the Court enters today.”
The direction to the clerk not to accept more civil petitions without collecting the normal fee is nothing new; nothing is “out of place”. Schneller is far from the first petitioner to abuse the Court’s process in this way. The Court has issued the same order many times, citing the same rule and the same case, with the same dissent from Justice Stevens.
C.N.Natus seems to have misunderstood:
“Frivolous or malicious” is from the rule the Court cited. I quoted and linked it my first post on this article. Don’t shoot the messenger.
Uh, Phil. That was an Order, but not an Opinion.
brygenon,
Now, now, now. You’ve been here long enough to know that this “fantasy,” as you’ve long called it, of an issue is really so much of a non-issue that you should probably call up MSNBC and tell them to quit spending 8 minutes — eight minutes — of quite obviously valuable programming (um, ratings…?) on such a “fantasy” of an issue.
I mean, can you really believe it? Not only is this such a “fantasy” on this blog, but even MSNBC is entertaining such a “fantasy” on their channel. And 8 whole minutes at that.
In reality, cable channels don’t spend 8 minutes on a non-issue, maybe unless their ratings are already in the crapper; I’m certainly not sure what else to make of it.
I will say, however, that they did a great job of surveying the issue, so somebody has clearly been “fantasizing” of this “fantasy” of an issue.
-Phil
Sam Lowry,
I guess it’s a good thing that I qualify every singular piece of verbiage that flows from the postings on my bodaciously kewl web site, huh? Notice that I did not say that this was the reason why Associate Justice Stevens dissented.
The fact of the matter is that, based solely on the docket entry, we don’t exactly know against what the Justice dissented. You say you know, I say I don’t know.
-Phil
Matt,
This is not what the Court said. What they said is that Mr. Schneller is not to be submitting anything further to the Court without paying all required Court costs; they are not barring him from submitting any further petitions with the high Court.
-Phil
Phil had nothing better to write than:
Oh, face reality, Phil. All you guys are doing is heaping failure and defeat upon yourselves. No one really needs you more shut down than you already are.
Birthers had failed to take the clue from previous denials and dismissals. Will this clear statement of what the U.S. Supreme Court thinks of the case make a difference? Schneller was arguing the usual birther load, and the court wrote it off as “frivolous or malicious”.
“See Martin v. District of Columbia Court of Appeals, 506 U.S. 1 (1992) (per curiam). Justice Stevens dissents. See id., at 4, and cases cited therein.”
Reading comprehension is not your strong suit.
Justice Stevens did not dissent in Schneller, he dissented in Martin v District of Columbia.
Phil wrote:
Umm, Phil? Justice Stevens dissented in the Martin v. District of Columbia Court of Appeals case, not in Schneller v. Cortes. Over at Politijab, we’ve been predicting that you Birfers wouldn’t be able to figure that out, and you proved us right. Read for yourself: “Stevens’s dissent“
NewEnglandPatriot says:
June 27, 2009 at 9:02 am
“I wonder, had Mr. Schneller paid whatever the fee would have been, if the Supreme Court would have heard the case or at least not denied the Writ?”
No, but if he’d had to pay the $300 docket fee he might have thought it over before filing his 5th case to the SC in 2 years. That’s your tax dollars he’s been using to have his 5 cases handled by the court for free. Every case petitioned to the court is considered and that requires paperwork to be filed, copied, distributed. It takes the time of judges’ clerks to review the case, write briefs, discuss with other clerks and the justices. The cost to handle each case is probably much more than the $300 docket fee.
Concerned Citizen says:
June 27, 2009 at 11:06 am
“Would anyone care to comment on or explain the part about “repeatedly abused this Court’s process”? What did he do?”
Schneller has filed 5 cases with SC in forma pauperis, no fees, in the last 2 years.
http://search.access.gpo.gov/supreme-court/SearchRight.asp?ct=Supreme-Court-Dockets&q1=schneller&x=27&y=23
I am concerned that the Justices may not have actually dismissed this case. Remember Orly Taiz spoke to one of them at a book signing and he said that he hadn’t heard of the cases against Obama. The clerks could have written this opinion and the case may not have even been discussed in conference. The part about Mr. Schneller is not to submit anything further to the Court seems kind of out of place.
Brygenon,
Why do you adopt such a malicious and frivolous interpretation of the Scotus’ determination in this case?
I would really like to hear something regarding your personal feelings and emotions, since these seem to be the substance of your participation on this forum….
Concerned Citizen asked:
A search of the Supreme Court docket shows that James D. Schneller has filed at least 6 Supreme Court actions in the past 3 years, presumably all as equally groundless as the one that was just dismissed. So the Supreme Court is saying they are tired of getting garbage from him and aren’t going to waive their procedural rules or let him file stuff for free any more.
You have to keep in mind that the current case had no logical connection whatsoever with Obama’s candidacy. Schneller sued because Arlen Specter was designated as a Republican elector for McCain, when he was Constitutionally ineligible. (The Constitution is clear: a Senator cannot be an elector).
However, McCain LOST the election in Pennsylvania so none of his slate of electors actually participated in the electoral college. The crux of Schneller’s claim is that an inelegible elector was nominated, but lost the election and never did anything. So it is irrelevant to Obama’s status or to the Pennsylvania vote.
Now here is a potentially interesting case: suppose that the election had come out differently, and McCain had won Pennsylvania, and the math had worked out so that there was a statistical tie in the electoral college. (Check the map at http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/06/17/what-happens-if-obama-and_n_107529.html for an example). In THAT case, the vote would have been 269-269. If someone had challenged Specter’s qualifications as an elector, arguably it could have reduced the number of votes from Pennsylvania by one, resulting in an Obama victory, 269-268. The irony would have been that Specter has in the past called for the abolition of the electoral college… so he could have been a spoiler in a close race.
But that didn’t happen. Obama won an overwhelming number of electoral votes, including the votes for Pennsylvania, and Arlen Specter did not become an elector.
Schneller’s case was clearly moot and is totally irrelevant to Obama’s election.
brygenon,
Now I need you to dutifully go back to PJ and create a new thread entitled, “Birthers are Maliciously Abusing the Judiciary in America,” and then come back to my site and continue to create commentary such as, “Since you birthers are maliciously abusing the judicial process in this country, I think you should cease and desist all your actions before someone comes along and really shuts you freaks down.”
Come on, now, don’t make me lose face. Prove me correct [grin]
-Phil
The court cited rule 38.8 in denying Schneller’s petition to file in forma pauperis. The rule reads:
“If satisfied that a petition for a writ of certiorari, jurisdictional statement, or petition for an extraordinary writ is frivolous or malicious, the Court may deny leave to proceed in forma pauperis.”
http://www.supremecourtus.gov/ctrules/2007rulesofthecourt.pdf
Thus we see that the court denied the pauperis petition not because they thought Schneller could afford the fees, but because it was satisfied that the associated petition for cert is frivolous or malicious.
I thought the scales of justice were to be blind…meaning that one’s wealth was not to be an issue to determine one’s liberties? I guess this just goes to show that even our ‘highest’ court in the land is bought and paid for.
Would anyone care to comment on or explain the part about “repeatedly abused this Court’s process”? What did he do?
I wonder, had Mr. Schneller paid whatever the fee would have been, if the Supreme Court would have heard the case or at least not denied the Writ? I bet then they would have found some other excuse not to have anything to do with it.
We have an illegitimate POTUS, a complicit Congress, Supreme Court and all lower courts, and the country is supposed to function?????
Without the Constitution, there is no rule of law. There is only the rule of Obama. That means anyone at any time can be incarcerated for no reason. The society we had which was based on the Constitution is disintegrating before our eyes.
Someone pulling the strings of our government wanta Obama in, whether he’s eligible or not. My opinion is that the military is going to have to refuse to follow his orders and confront him. All they have to do is ask him to produce documentation that he is a natural-born citizen. This can be done peacefully but pointedly. It’s past time.