What can be done about this Supreme Court’s very worst decisions?

jeffw@lemmy.world to politics @lemmy.world – 130 points –
What can be done about this Supreme Court’s very worst decisions?
vox.com
22

Easiest answer.

Pack the court. It's perfectly legal. No laws or precedent against it. Just a lack of political will and spine.

Kamala could do it. I'm not saying she would, but she's not biden, and he definitely wasn't gonna do it. We can hope.

* Only if dems keep the senate, though. This is why down ballot races matter a lot

Biden is such a wuss when it comes to stuff like precedents

Joe should do it after the votes are counted in November, irrespective of who wins. If its a Trump win, a packed court gives some stability and a check on Trump. If its a Harris win, then there's no fallout for Harris making the call, and she has 4 years of a stable and sane Supreme Court.

Congress would have to pass a bill to pack the court, which the President would sign. The new Congress is seated early, though. If Democrats got their majorities they can send Joe a bill right away in the 2 weeks overlap.

That only solves the problem future decisions. Previous decisions would have to go back through the whole court system to hope to get reversed.

The current court has shown pretty clear distain for stare decisis and allowing things to skip the other courts when politically expedient. Plenty of precedent now established to undo the damage.

I think the author dismisses packing the court way too easily.

Packing the Court would almost certainly destroy the legitimacy of the federal judiciary in the eyes of many Republicans and would lead to massive resistance from red states.

Well, guess what? McConnell's game of "Keep Away" with Merrick Garland's nomination, combined with these rulings, has already destroyed the legitimacy of the Federal judiciary in the eyes of many. We're already there. Pack the court, then double-dare Republicans to gain control of the Presidency and both houses of Congress again if they want to double-pack it.

I fucking HATE how Republicans get to pull the slimyest, shittiest stuff ever, and then when Democrats are in power it's instantly "but think of the decorum!!!" This author can eat a bag of dicks.

Do you mean gutting the voting rights act?

Legalizing bribery?

Eliminating federal regulatory power?

Citizens united?

Couldn't Congress also pass a law restricting the scope of SCOTUS's authority? Seems like that might be the easiest path forward.

SCOTUS themselves might declare new laws or even new constitutional amendments invalid because "that was not envisioned by the founding fathers" or some bull like that

SCOTUS doesn't have a mechanism to enforce their decisions. They rely on everyone else accepting their authority and going along with it.

The constitution does give Congress the authority to set the jurisdiction of the courts. They could say that another court like the DC Circuit Court of Appeals would be the court of final appeal for any laws involving SCOTUS.

They don't have the authority to rule on the validity of a constitutional amendment, though that's moot because they do have the authority to rule on the interpretation of it

Constitutional amendments, and forcing lower courts' hands to make compelling but contradicting rulings. I guarantee once Harris is in office, they'll roll back all the God King President bullshit. I don't forsee getting an Amendment from a majority of states for that fix though.

Well, they could certainly rule on the process of the Amendment, but I agree they could not strike down the amendment itself if it proceeds properly.

A lot of the bad rulings were kicked to lower courts. The God King bullshit also requires lower court actions because there was no definition of "official acts".

Side question: what is going on in the thumbnail?

It looks like Justice Roberts is giving Drumpf the most emotional of hand jobs while maintaining eye contact.