111th Congress
Early in the 111th Congress two identical bills were introduced in both the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate to give servicemembers the same right to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court as civilian citizens. On January 15, 2009, Rep. Davis (D-Calif.) Chairwoman of the House Armed Services Subcommittee on Military Personnel|Subcommittee on Military Personnel of the House Armed Services Committee reintroduced the bill in the 111th Congress as the Equal Justice for Our Military Act of 2009, H.R. 569. H.R. 569 was referred to the House Judiciary Committee. Identical legislation was also introduced on January 30, 2009, when Senators Feinstein (D-Calif.), then-Republican Arlen Specter and Russ Feingold (D-Wis.) reintroduced the Senate bill in the 111th Congress as the Equal Justice for United States Military Personnel Act of 2009, S. 357. The language of the reintroduced bills were the same as the previous bills in 110th Congress. Both the House and Senate bills were also the same language as MacLean first proposed to Congress in 2004.
On February 24, 2009, Chairman Skelton and Rep. Davis of House Armed Services Committee sent a letter to the House Judiciary Committee calling for a hearing on the Equal Justice for Our Military Act of 2009.
In March 2009 before a joint session of the House and Senate Veterans' Affairs Committees, Ira Novoselsky, the national commander of the Jewish War Veterans of the United States of America announced that JWV was making the House bill and the issue of Supreme Court access for service members a legislative priority. Novoselsky asked the Veteran's Committee to weigh in on the important issue and stated that "JWV supports legislation that will restore due process and equal treatment under the law for our service members and veterans".
Read more about this topic: Equal Justice For United States Military Personnel Legislation
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“Such is the labor which the American Congress exists to protect,—honest, manly toil,—honest as the day is long,—that makes his bread taste sweet, and keeps society sweet,—which all men respect and have consecrated; one of the sacred band, doing the needful but irksome drudgery.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)