Joe Biden worries that the “extreme” US supreme court, dominated by rightwing justices, cannot be relied upon to uphold the rule of law.
“I worry,” the president told ProPublica in interview published on Sunday. “Because I know that if the other team, the Maga Republicans, win, they don’t want to uphold the rule of law.”
“Maga” is shorthand for “Make America great again”, Donald Trump’s campaign slogan. Trump faces 91 criminal charges and assorted civil threats but nonetheless dominates Republican polling for the nomination to face Biden in a presidential rematch next year.
In four years in the White House, Trump nominated and saw installed three conservative justices, tilting the court 6-3 to the right. That court has delivered significant victories for conservatives, including the removal of the right to abortion and major rulings on gun control, affirmative action and other issues.
The new court term, which starts on Tuesday, could see further such rulings on matters including government environmental and financial regulation.
A system that appoints supreme constitutional judges for life and without even halfway serious democratic checks and balances seems to me the perfect recipe for disaster and corruption. But hey, I’m from Europe, so what do I know… ¯_(ツ)_/¯
Yes but you fail to consider that some guys wrote on a paper like 250 years ago and we’ve decided that everything needs to be viewed through the lens of either “does this agree with an incredibly pedantic and stilted reading of this document” or “what would those historical dudes think about this” - whichever happens to be more politically expedient for you at the moment, but the second one tends to give you more flexibility.
I also love the stars and bars I’ve seen on Canadian trucks or in their front yard.
Makes perfect sense. Canada has a rich tradition of being a southern state during the civil war.
Yeah, because making gun ownership harder/illegal is going to stop the fucking American Taliban from continuing terror attacks…
They’d barely even notice and half the cops would be with them.
everything needs to be viewed through the lens of either “does this agree with an incredibly pedantic and stilted reading of this document” or “what would those historical dudes think about this”
To be fair, they did expect us to modify the constitution from generation to generation.
Ultimately the failure is ours.
It’s amazing to me the way we’ve elevated the constitution to near biblical proportions. And just like the Bible where every church and pastor interprets it in their own way, so too do our 9 oracles in black robes interpret the will of our village elders from ages past.
One of the more interesting things I saw (on this topic) was a historian stating that George Washington (and his contemporaries) would have been able to relate the world of Julius Cesar more than they would our modern world.
I think about that A LOT whenever I hear some idiot spout nonsense about the “vision and ideals” of the founding fathers
I disagree. That was BC. It’d be like saying people born in the 1930s relate more to colonial times than today. There are some of them who are still alive. While a percentage want nothing to do with modern ways, I think the type to be involved in forming a nation would be lifelong learners akin to the old folks who have little trouble with today’s modernities.
Yup, I see. A bit like with the Bible and other holy books then. Even here in Europe, there are many who see the wording of those as the ultimate truth. No need to adjust anything, they say. It’s all good. It’s god’s will or whatever - if it helps their agenda, that is. Jesus, that must be frustrating.
They also tend to ignore pretty much all the stuff Jesus actually taught.
That’s kind of what it’s devolved into, tbh. The confluence of Christian fundamentalism and politics is a scary fucking thing, because when you’re “doing god’s work”, you can justify literally anything to yourself and your fellow “good Christians”.
Europe at least has had the benefit of being able to work country-by-country, whereas the US is one massive tangled morass. Hell, even achieving the kind of restructuring and harmonious cooperation that you see in the EU had to come as a result of two of the most atrocious wars humanity has ever mustered in the span of less than half a century.
Kinda puts it a little more into perspective when you consider the absolute shit-show Europe had to turn into before it was ready to grow up.
For better or worse, it’s next to impossible to successfully modify the Constitution without significant support. It has to be ratified by about 38 States (3/4 of the State legislatures or 3/4 of the conventions called in each State). That’s after either 2/3 of both Houses of Congress propose an amendment or 2/3 of the State legislatures request one via a convention.
In a way, it’s a good thing since it keeps the Constitution from being able to be changed on a whim, and it mostly keeps it from being affected by the political tug-of-war that happens every few years in the US.
It’s also a bad thing, though, as it makes it very difficult to adapt to certain situations that wouldn’t have happened 200+ years ago.
“It’s also a bad thing”
You realise you can change laws? Congress does it regularly. The Constitution primarily restricts the type of laws that can be passed. Congress has huge leeway otherwise.
It’s also a bad thing, though, as it makes it very difficult to adapt to certain situations that wouldn’t have happened 200+ years ago.
I would argue though that if it’s something that truly needs to be changed by the majority that it would get done.
The problem is the way our politics are today (those in office care more about gaining money to stay in office than their constituency, etc.), and the population being split almost down the middle and adhearing to that mindset (‘my team is always right’) over the common good, makes getting that type of majority almost impossible.
But again, that’s still on us, not our forefathers.
Not anymore. They are just making shit up now. The check is congress impeaching them. That will not happen if enough people demand it.
It’ll never happen as long as republicans control either half of congress. People have been sounding the alarm on their power grabs for decades and only now are some people starting to listen.
I expect the American experiment to fail in my lifetime.
I’m not sure that I see the American Collapse happening in my lifetime as a certainty, but I would agree that it’s a very strong possibility if we don’t get our shit together pretty fucking quick.
Hey. You can’t just use common sense when it comes to our Judicial System. That would be too logical. What next? You gonna ask that our Supreme Court Justices have Ethics Rules!?
What is this world coming to?
Article V of the the Constitution.
https://constitution.congress.gov/browse/essay/artV-1/ALDE_00000507/#
Amending the Constitution was intended to be much more usable, but over half the country doesn’t vote.
I can see how 9 out of 13 colonies (or equivalent votes in congress) might be more plausible than 34/50 states or 357/535 congresspeople (house + senate) considering the state of politics today.
The framers counted on congresspersons being good faith actors that loved America, and on a populace that wasn’t apathetic or incompetent on important matters of state.
on the Application of the Legislatures of two thirds of the several States, shall call a Convention
Always wondered what the legal definition of “several” was, as it applies to that clause.
Yeah, the drafters of our constitution really fucked up in that regard.
I’d attempt to solve the problem by creating an independent judicial review board entirely separate from the US govt. similar to other “professional” professions. Let these judges go up for review every 5 years and if they are found to be in breach of conduct, remove them from the bench.
Also, rework how they get to the bench in the first place. Of course the SC is going to be politically motivated. They only get their seats because one of the two big parties literally puts them there. Impartiality is really hard to claim when you owe your entire existence as a SC judge to a giant money machine.
Lifetime appointments mean they don’t owe anyone shit. They have nothing to gain by being loyal to the party that appointed them. There are better ways to accomplish the same thing, but it’s at least one facet of how the court works that seems to do what it’s supposed to.
The whole point of a lifetime appointment is that they can abandon all political concerns once they’re in the SCOTUS - so they don’t have to be political. And I’ve seen that happen - while they obviously stay conservative or progressive, they tend to drift away from an alignment with the parties - with exceptions, obviously.
But, as with all other branches of the US government, it’s becoming clear that we’ve exited the era of being able to trust our leadership to support the Constitution and represent the people.
(For me, it wasn’t even Trump that snapped me out of that mindset. It was when they were talking about outlawing congressional insider trading. One of the Republicans said, out loud and in public, that the notion of prohibiting congressional sick trading was off the table, because it was a core part of the job. He said something like, “half of us wouldn’t be here” - as though that was a bad thing.)
You should get the same behavior with a single term appointment with no possibility of a second term. There would also have to be limits to what they can do AFTER the appointment too, so they don’t use their single term power to set themselves up when they are done. I guess it would have to be a single term appointment with an extended ban on future employment or investments.
I don’t necessarily think the founders fucked up. It’s important that the court be free from political influence when deciding cases so I think they had the right idea. I’m not necessarily opposed to lifetime appointments. Where I think there’s a lot of room for improvement is the nomination and confirmation process. It’s entirely political, contentious, and has produced a few lousy justices in recent years.
This idea of one party only appointing conservatives and the other only appointing liberals and both sides hating the other’s appointments is what’s fucked up. What could be interesting is a bipartisan Congressional nominating committee that produces candidates that are at least palatable to both sides. Let’s say there’s a 2/3 majority requirement for the committee to nominate someone. They could produce a list of several candidates and the president nominates one of them. Basically take this process away from partisan NGOs and give it to a bipartisan group of elected representatives.
Yeah, the drafters of our constitution really fucked up in that regard.
The thing is, the drafters of the constitution didnt mean for the supreme Court to be as powerful as it is today. There is nothing in the constitution that even grants them the power of judicial review. They just interpreted that they inherently had that power, and we’ve gone along with it for the last hundred years.
According to the drafters, separating the judicial branch from the executive was a way to inhibit veto power and to prevent the executive from reshaping laws that have been passed by Congress. There only other function was to handle cases between two states, and to oversee an impeachment trial in the Senate.
It wasn’t entirely about the rights to review, but also about their impotence to do more than just talk. The balance of powers isn’t just that Congress can impeach, but also that they can write laws that address the Court’s arguments directly and the executive can just tell them “no”. But we’ve let them just be the final arbiter of law with no response from either other body, so they’re now just unelected super-legislators.
When the court is embroiled in corruption scandals and abandoning precedent to strip rights from citizens, the other executive institutions in the country shouldn’t just be acquiescing to their demands. Instead we get “you may be unethical and corrupt, and firing off society shaking reinterpretations to settled law, but thems the breaks”.
Tiptoeing into calling their adherence to the rule of law into question is moving in the right direction, but very slowly. Maybe that’s the right way to do it, but I don’t really trust that it’s not just a misplaced belief in the system to work itself out so moderates don’t have to actually do anything that might be scary.
It’s really a shame that so many seem to be clinging to a constitution that is close to 250 years old. You would think that some things would need to be updated over that period of time, but as I said, I’m from Europe…
Our constitution has been updated. Our current constitution is from the 90s. It’s just we update it in pain in the ass bits and pieces
I find it interesting that there are so many Europeans that have such strong opinions on the US, yet they don’t keep themselves informed on the same.
The US Constitution has been updated many, many times since it was written.
They probably never expected anyone in government to be so openly corrupt and incorrigible. At the time they wrote the declaration they probably viewed democracy like the roman Republic did and thought the people would categorically reject anyone willfully stealing their rights and freedoms for their own political or personal gain. Of course they couldn’t foresee a political party so openly hypocritical that they would literally lie on mass to a public brainwashed by unchecked “news” publications that only regurgitate what they want to hear. Democracy is f*cked, blame the murdochs.
Joe Biden worries that the “extreme” US supreme court, dominated by rightwing justices, cannot be relied upon to uphold the rule of law.
If he really worries about that, and is not just scaring people to vote for him, then he has a responsibility to enlarge the court.
I’d argue this should have been the immediate response to Mitch McConnell blocking nominees half a term away from an election, but if the court can’t uphold the rule of law, it should be fixed (and expansion seems like the obvious solution) or replaced.
The procedural question on this one is whether he could shrink the court to boot say… Thomas, then expand it again to replace him with someone less obviously corrupt. Republicans fail to confirm a replacement? We’ll shrink the court a little more. Obviously, this won’t happen, but I’m interested to know if it’s possible.
Shrinking it (through established legal channels) is impeachment and removal which has a high bar. Enlarging it is just passing a law, which is only hard because the senate has a policy (not a law) to effectively not pass laws without supermajorities. The latter could be done with a simple majority of politicians with a spine.
I’d argue this should have been the immediate response to Mitch McConnell blocking nominees half a term away from an election
Honestly I feel like that needed a civil war level response, that really should not have been allowed/normalized, regardless of which party initiated the block.
whether he could shrink the court to boot say… Thomas, then expand it again to replace him
I couldn’t agree to that, that’s way too manipulative and dishonors the previous selections from previous presidents.
I would expect him to just expand the court by two seats, if he was going to try to do something along these lines.
dishonors the previous selections from previous presidents.
To what degree should prior selections be honored/respected if the presidents in question won under questionable circumstances, e.g. George W. Bush’s election in 2000 and the stopping of the Florida recount, or Donald J. Trump’s election in 2016 after his call for foreign interference, alongside James Comey reopening the investigation into Hillary Clinton just before the election?
My preference would be to simply enlarge the court by a few seats, nominate some additional candidates that exceed the number of available seats by 2 or 3, and then hold some sort of Survivor-like competition to see who captures the seats. I would also accept a Hunger Games style competition for this first new court session.
The supreme court is supposed to be based on certain numbers, when those numbers increased the SC could have been increased, but hasn’t been.
Basically all it would take is for the president to decide “hey this court is supposed to be bigger, because the rules it wrote for itself say so” and sign a few things and boom. Increased court size.
What? Where did you find executive branch authority to regulate the Supreme Court?
Even if they did, how would a president appoint justices without Congress?
Other than political gain for one team or the other, what is the argument for expanding the supreme Court?
To correct for the explicitly political gain one team is solely interested in for their own authoritarian redefinition of established precedent that also had their nominees lie their way into their SC positions at the expense of the Constitution and our freedoms. That’s the argument.
you don’t think by expanding the court the “other side” isn’t just doing the same exact thing you just described? so where does it stop?
I am concerned about the obvious concerning things as well. Y’all should make me your leader.
I love completely unaware comments like this. President stable genius wasn’t really all that stable nor all that much of a genius. Dude bragged about memorizing 5 words in a TV interview.
If you’re willing to mention one as a disqualifying factor, you should really take a long hard look at the other candidate through the same lens.
Also … to be fair… my capability to walk on a stage has no bearing on my ability to be president. FDR used a wheel chair and had ramps installed in the White House. I find it terrible that we disparage our presidents based on their physical abilities.
I would put more stock in whether they can string together a cogent argument on a debate, or whether they can actually put together a sentence with correct punctuation, spelling, and grammar…
So your argument is literally “both sides”… I thought both siding was frowned upon
I don’t understand this whataboutism the US has going on. Trump was a megalomaniac and didn’t give a shit about the country. Biden is a demented old man and doesn’t give a shit about the country.
Democrats and republicans have chosen horrible leaders this past decade. Can’t you see it’s harming you all? Why are you acting like this is a sports team you’ll die following?
Then maybe he should have packed the court with some good judges
Would have had to nuke the filibuster to make it where they could pack the court. That required yes votes from all Democratic senators (only because not a single fucking Republican would vote for it), and Manchin and Sinema refused to do it.
Nothing Biden could have done. We needed more Democrats in Senate seats. That’s the game though. Republicans do their best to make us feel like voting doesn’t matter, then we don’t turn up - making it easier for Republicans to say the government doesn’t work.
Nothing Biden could have done.
He could have attacked them. Called on their constituents to protest outside their offices. Politics is more than just filing papers and casting votes.
I don’t think he’s exactly even capable of doing so. SCOTUS judges have to retire or die, and then vacant seats have to get confirmed by the Senate, and no self-respecting Republican Supreme Court justice would die while in office. Expanding the number of justices is also extremely unlikely to happen, and also, relevantly, not really in Joe’s hands.
The notable historical threat to pack the courts previously (which succeeded in moderating the court without packing) was done by a president. They don’t have unilateral authority, but they are the leader of the party. Stuff doesn’t happen unless leaders lead.
At least they’re finally starting to get a clue that “They go low, we go high” is bullshit
