@laura-f I know it is probably impossible to actually secede but my point was just that this objective was written into the Texas Republican platform and so it seems to confirm some of the predictions here that the US might eventually separate into more than one country.
@2ndfdl
Wow! Thank you for posting a link to this 'supporting' document. Talk about cognitive dissonance.....
This article provides specific examples of the phenomenon I described, anti-abortionists who seek abortions and then return to their anti-abortion stances
Here is the link again so folks don't have to going looking:
https://joycearthur.com/abortion/the-only-moral-abortion-is-my-abortion/
Of course, the President has the authority to try to do it. For us to have a majority we will need 4 more. The problem that the jurist see is that SCOTUS will become a monster. Meaning, it will work for us now, but the next Republican president will do the same, and the next one, the same, and the next one the same, and so forth... Personally, I wouldn't mind it right now, but I believe this Republican, disguised as a Democrat, Manchin, will oppose it. Remember, the Justices have to be ratified by the Senate.
@laura-f Just out of curiosity, what is the means by which Congress could rein in the Supreme Court?
All of this is presuming the filibuster is a non-issue, but Congress has the rights to:
- Impeach judges that perjure themselves
- Cancel unfair SCOTUS rulings via legislation
- Increase (or decrease) the number of justices
@Laura F
We cannot decrease the number of Justices. The position is for life. I would love to see them impeached (specially the creepy Kavanaugh). They can be impeached for saying that Roe v Wade was "settled law", as they literally said. It is perjury. But, you know? It could be difficult to prove, because they can say: "Oh, I just changed my mind".
Cancel rulings if they are only implicit (according to SCOTUS) in the Constitution, or not found in the Constitution. Another thing is to legislate around those decisions, meaning legislate on things that were not said or decided by SCOTUS in that particular case.
@tgraf66 -
The Constitution provides a number of paths by which Congress can restrain and discipline a rogue court.
It can impeach and remove justices. It can increase or decrease the size of the court itself (at its inception, the Supreme Court had only six members). It can strip the court of its jurisdiction over certain issues or it can weaken its power of judicial review by requiring a supermajority of justices to sign off on any decision that overturns a law. Congress can also rebuke the court with legislation that simply cancels the decision in question. It needs the political will to do any of this, which is sadly lacking at present. I have hope that we will find the will and the people who will lead the.
It has often been true in history that change comes from common people who rouse the hearts and minds of society to demand change. Then the politicians see the parade and get in front to lead. Think of someone like Greta Thunberg as example.
It can strip the court of its jurisdiction over certain issues or it can weaken its power of judicial review by requiring a supermajority of justices to sign off on any decision that overturns a law. Congress can also rebuke the court with legislation that simply cancels the decision in question.
I was not aware of the first two, so thank you for educating me. :-) I do have a couple of questions, though.
For the first one, if that were done, would a case that normally could be appealed to SCOTUS then have to stand on the decision of whatever lower court decided it? That seems rather dangerous to me, since many of the 5-4 precedents that expanded freedoms were only in front of SCOTUS because of the appeal process, to-wit, Obergefell, Brown, and Loving.
In the second, Roe was not a law; it was a precedent, so I'm not sure how that applies here. If that condition were active, Roe would never have been precedent in the first place since the original decision was also 5-4.
In the case of the third one you mentioned, how does that work? I'm certainly not a Constitutional scholar nor am I familiar with all of the relevant precedent, but from where does that power derive? I don't recall anything in the Constitution that gives Congress the power to reverse or negate SCOTUS decisions except perhaps by attempting to codify the issue into a law that makes the decision moot. Even in that case, couldn't a suit be brought to SCOTUS as the Court of First Instance - by an entity with standing to do so, of course -- a State, perhaps - charging that any such new law would be unconstitutional based on the precedent the decision set in the first place?
@Laura F
We cannot decrease the number of Justices. The position is for life. I would love to see them impeached (specially the creepy Kavanaugh). They can be impeached for saying that Roe v Wade was "settled law", as they literally said. It is perjury. But, you know? It could be difficult to prove, because they can say: "Oh, I just changed my mind".
Cancel rulings if they are only implicit (according to SCOTUS) in the Constitution, or not found in the Constitution. Another thing is to legislate around those decisions, meaning legislate on things that were not said or decided by SCOTUS in that particular case.
1. Congress CAN decrease as well as increase, but of course decreasing would be idiotic.
2. Cancel = by legislation, sorry if that wasn't clear.