The Case For Expanding The Supreme Court

[Shell_Seas]

Why more Supreme Justices are needed to align the Court with 21st Century America.

https://www.lonestarleft.com/p/the-case-for-expanding-the-supreme



In recent years, the integrity and impartiality of the United States Supreme Court have come under intense scrutiny. Amidst allegations of corruption and accusations that some justices perjured themselves during confirmation hearings—particularly concerning their stances on Roe v. Wade—the Court’s’ composition has ignited debate.

The confirmation processes have been tarnished by political maneuvering, casting long shadows over the justices’’ legitimacy and the Court’s’ role as a neutral arbiter of justice. This controversy is further compounded by several contentious decisions that have emerged from the Court, impacting voting rights, environmental regulations, and workers’ rights, among others. These rulings have not only reshaped the legal landscape of America but also raised questions about the extent to which the Court is influenced by partisan considerations rather than the impartial application of the law.

The call to expand the Supreme Court is gaining momentum to restore balance and faith in an institution at the heart of American democracy. It’s time for America to explore the necessity of reform to ensure that the Court upholds its duty to the American people fairly and without political bias.

[WarGamer]

1. Unless the Court was 6-3 Liberal justices... then no one except Ted Cruz would advocate expansion.

I don't like bending rules because of partisanship.

[dpibel]

7. To what rules do you refer?

AFAIK, the "rule," to the extent that there is one, is that Congress sets the number of Supreme Court justices.

How would urging Congress to change the number constitute "bending the rules"?

[WarGamer]

11. Call it the unwritten rule that's kept it at 9 for 155 years...

And the chances of getting it through Congress are nil.

Just win elections. If the "But Hillary" crowd would have thought past the tip of their noses, it'd be a liberal SCOTUS today and only Free Republic and Sean Hannity would be for expanding the Court.

[dpibel]

13. Bending unwritten rules

Got it.

I mean, how can you argue with that?

[WarGamer]

14. Plz see my other post with a question for you

[dpibel]

16. I done saw it, boss.

I can only respond to one of your posts at a time.

Sorry if I got the order wrong!

[edhopper]

25. So it has been expanded

And the number of Circuits has been expanded. How about one justice per district.

[In It to Win It]

29. I feel like everyone should agree that lower courts should be expanded

the lower courts truly need it. The lower courts are overwhelmed.

Even that would be politicized so the judiciary will remain the same even as caseloads and the population increases.

[The Magistrate]

38. Here's Your Problem, Sir

It's all very well to give the civics class answer 'I don't like bending rules because of partisanship'.

We are in our present circumstance because only one party to the fight does so.

I am absolutely in favor of 'bending rules because of partisanship' if the practice has already entered the contest, both to overweigh the practice of our opponent, and to secure advantage to our side in order to put in place good people, carry out good policies, and enact good laws.

I can hear you gearing up to say 'that's what Ted Cruz would say if we had our way!' or 'you wouldn't like them doing it', and so will make myself pellucidly clear: I don't give a fuck about nonesense like that, and have scant respect for anyone who allows themselves to be imposed on by it. The difference is not in the means employed to attain a goal, the difference is in the goal to be attained. Your position boils down to this:

It's headquarters.

Says the General to the Colonel I want you take your tanks round the flank, get into their rear and cut them off.

Says the Colonel I can't do that, sir.

WHAT!?!

Because that's what Nazis do, Sir! says the Colonel. Nazis run tanks round a flank and cut off people from supplies and retreat so the front collapses and gets bagged! We're better than that, Sir! We're better than Nazis!

You're not engaged in critiquing a scenario, whether it's one which gives each side a decent hand to play when, say, Napoleon strikes for the Nile in '98, without much advantage to either side being built into the rules of play. You're not trying to set a bookie's line to make the monies on either side balance so you can't lose. This is a real fight, with real stakes, and real consequences for millions of people, who one side wishes to see prosper and the other wishes to immiserate. And should you say 'That's just what Ted Cruz thinks about his side' there's nothing to say but You're hopeless....


"If you're in a fair fight, you fucked up."

[WarGamer]

44. Hmmm... I hear ya. Thanks for the thoughts!

[TwilightZone]

2. "influenced by partisan considerations"

Well, that's pretty much what the expansion is intended to do, if we're honest here. It's a partisan maneuver with some flowery language about restoring order and the like, but I don't think we're fooling anyone.

Any expansion would be countered by the GOP as soon as they were able.

Rinse and repeat.

The time to deal with the Supreme Court was the 2016 election. Some insisted that it wasn't enough of an issue to support our candidate, and there were consequences that will last decades.

[dpibel]

10. You say this as if it's a bad thing

OK. There are tit-for-tat additions to the court, ad infinitum.

Can you tell me, please, what is so magical about having a 9-member court?

Frankly, it's a bit absurd to place that much power in such a small body of people who are both unelected and tenured for life.

That's a bad combination for a small group of people who can (as we are seeing in real time) wreak havoc.

[WarGamer]

12. Honest question...

I'd love to hear your answer.

9 Justices today... let's pretend you could expand to 19.

That's 10 new Judges but you had to let the GOP choose 5.

Would you still be in favor of expansion? Or is expansion just an "end around" to winning elections?

[dpibel]

15. Fun game!

But, gee. Speaking of bending the rules, does the name "Merrick Garland" ring any bells with you?

Frankly, and (although I don't expect you to believe me), I'd be fine with a 50/50 split on 10 new justices.

Even assuming the Federalist Society picks the right-wing five, I like the odds better at 11 to 8 than 6 to 3. Math is cool like that. And, as we have seen from time to time with this gang of miscreants, even somebody like Gorsuch will occasionally take the right side of a proposition; Kavanaugh, too, and Barrett. The more wild cards the better, I'd say.

Let's be honest: Mitch McConnell already killed the proposition that the composition of the Supreme Court is a matter of winning elections. He did it twice.

So tell me again the one about how expanding the court is some major foul that would only be proposed by the unprincipled as a response to the lily-white moral brigade led by Mitch?

[dpibel]

18. Honest question:

What does your honest question have to do with my post to which it is ostensibly responding?

I said I think a much larger court would be good for a couple of reasons.

You honestly questioned how I would respond to an increase of 10, split by party.

How does that work, in terms of actual argumentation?

[WarGamer]

31. Just looking into motivation for the expansion...

But thanks for the thoughtful answer!

[Think. Again.]

3. It's perfectly reasonable to expand the Supreme Court...

...in order to keep it consistent with the number of circuit courts.

The massive growth of our population has necessitated the circuit court expansion to 13 circuit courts, and since the Supreme Court Justices divide up responsibility for those circuits (and the heavy increase in court activities), it only makes sense to now have 13 SC Justices.

[Zeitghost]

9. Said nobody ever

Prior to 2020.

We can at least be honest here. We don't like the court's makeup, so we want to expand it to shift that makeup back towards the left. Provided of course that it is a Democratic President nominating and a Democratic Senate confirming.

In a nightmare scenario where Trump wins and the Magats take the Senate, nobody here is advocating for court expansion.

[dpibel]

17. Damn, Skippy!

Was 2012 after 2020? Or is Jonathan Turley nobody? (If I had to choose, obvs., I go with the latter, but still...)

https://archive.is/9tPi1

While the best number is debatable, I believe that a 19-member court — roughly the average size of a circuit court — would be ideal. Just because we settled on the number 9 arbitrarily does not mean that any number is as good as any other. A 19-member or so court has been shown to work efficiently where a larger court would likely be unwieldy.

Date: June 22, 2012

Bonus clue: People have been talking about expanding the court for a long, long time. Both sides.

[Zeitghost]

19. I thought the context of my comments were pretty clear

But to clarify, my 2020 was an example of our side taking back control in Washington.

Both sides talk about it like both sides talk about ending the filibuster; it only happens when their side is in power.

[dpibel]

23. The Sky Will Falling!!!11!!

It's surpassing odd how even this utterly fact and population based proposal is met with hysteria, isn't it?

[Think. Again.]

28. Yep...

...but judging by some of these responses, I guess if it might end up benefitting Democrats, we couldn't possibly even consider it.

[Silent Type]

4. 10 years from now we'll have thousands on SC. Won't happen.

[dpibel]

8. Slippery Slopes! So much fun!!

It's always a weak argument.

Adding hyperbole doesn't make it stronger.

[Silent Type]

21. Pipe Dreams.

[dpibel]

22. A fair assessment

of your position.

Can't disagree with you on that.

[ripcord]

5. Not going to happen

Nor should it, this is nothing but a partisan power grab.

[Fiendish Thingy]

6. Wrong argument

The argument should be “make a case for why the court shouldn’t be expanded “, because expanding the court does not need a justification, it is obvious.

Court expansion/reform should be part of the party platform.

[Zeitghost]

20. Would it be part of the party platform

When Republicans hold the Senate and Whitehouse?

[dpibel]

24. Republicans will never hold Whitehouse!

Haven't you been following his long-running series about the power of dark money?

[Fiendish Thingy]

30. Why should that make any difference?

You’re saying it would cause Dems to lose elections…I disagree.

[Zeitghost]

34. No

I'm saying nobody advocating for this now would be doing the same if Trump were in the Whitehouse and McConnell was back in charge of the Senate. Which means it seems odd to put something in the party platform that nobody in the party would support should the opposition be in power.

The party platform seems to be something that we can support 100% of the time, not for political moves that only benefit us while we are in power.

[Fiendish Thingy]

39. I support court expansion and killing the filibuster regardless of who is in power

The larger the court, the less power and influence any single Justice has, and the less likely of consistent unanimity among any given “bloc” of justices.

Killing the filibuster will remove the shield from accountability for all senators, as more bills would get an up or down floor votes, which senators would individually be held accountable for by voters, rather hiding behind the filibuster as an excuse for inaction.

[Zeitghost]

41. Just to be clear

We wake up to another nightmare, Trump is in the WH, McConnell is back in charge in the Senate and you would whole hearetly support giving them another 3, 5, 7 seats on the Supreme Court?

[Fiendish Thingy]

42. They would also need control of congress to pass the expansion law.

In the unlikely event that actually happened, I wouldn’t be happy about it, but the need to expand the court is clear.

[Zeitghost]

43. Why would they need control of the House

If the law they are proposing is a well supported part of the official Democratic Party platform as you proposed it should be?

If Republicans in the House proposed a solid bill protecting abortion rights or expanding public education or funding affordable housing projects (all part of the Democratic platform), we would support it and get it passed (and then wonder what new dimension we had awaken to).

So why would it be any different for your proposal of adding court expansion to the platform?

[ColinC]

26. Okay we won one special election, let's not get ahead of ourselves

[yourout]

27. It's simple. Too much power in too few hands.

I think there should be 52 justices.

[dpibel]

32. Are you some democracy lunatic?

Distributing power?

What will you people propose next? One person, one vote?

Don't you know that 9 is the number of Supreme Court justices based on...oh, hell...something very important! It's been 9 since 1869, just as the United States has been 33 states since 1869 and the population of the U.S. has been 39,000,000 since 1869.

How could you think of upsetting that kind of continuity?

Some things simply do not change.

[Mark.b2]

33. A couple months ago, I found a podcast that replays SCOTUS oral hearings...

I'm not even an attorney. I've nerded out and found them absolutely fascinating and, in a weird way, entertaining. I've listened to enough that I can now distinguish which justice is who.

I've come away with a new appreciation for the Court. And setting justices' ideology aside, none are slouches on that bench. To be sure, some of them have very warped views on the constitution and lack compassionand common sense.

I've been quite surprised in the comity and congeniality among the justices. All of them seem to deal with each other in good faith. They all seem to have great respect for each other. They treat each other like other politicians in DC. I now have a hard time seeing how a disruptive ideologue could ever be effective thinking they could get on the Court and piss all the Court's norms, traditions, and deliberative pace. One has to play a long game.

One thing our side has is there's a history of the other side's justices being more apt to "soften up" overtime. Our three (Sotomayer, Karen and Jackson) are locks. They won't change.Their side really only has two locks (Thomas and Alito). The other four, while will nearly always disappoint, they have shown occasional glimpses or sanity. And Roberts and Gorsuch and even Kavanaugh will sometimes surprise. I think those three are as conservative as they'll ever be and will lessen over time. Like many intended conservative before them, they get less conservative as they become more experienced. Enough so, they can pleasantly surprise over time.

I like keeping the Court at nine. Like any "committee", the more bodies you add, the less effective and efficient and reasonable it becomes. As a good friend of mine says, one guy can wash a car in one hour. Two can wash it in 45 minutes. Three guys get you back to an hour. Four take an hour-and-fifteen minutes, and five will take the afternoon and everyone forgets the windshield. Adding more liberals to the Court would probably help win a few cases in the short run but at an expense.

I agree with others who are saying "just win elections". But then, I wouldn't compromise on putting the absolute best progressive minds on the Court. I do think age and/or term limits would help. Any justice 75 or older needs to step down, especially if their party is in power.

[Hermit-The-Prog]

35. I'd be happy with 15.

[Buckeyeblue]

36. Maybe we the number of justices could be more fluid

What if each president was allowed to add a new justice to the court when they get elected (and re-elected). As justices retire/pass away, they are only replaced if the total number of justices goes below 9. This would ensure that all presidents get to influence the make-up of the SC while tamping down some of the scurrying that goes on when a justice is lost.

[ecstatic]

37. I don't know what the solution is, but in its current form, the SCOTUS

is corrupt and illegitimate, as evidenced by their rulings over the past few years in which hard fought rights have been overturned and women and minorities are second and third class citizens.

Currently, members of the Supreme Court are above the law, able to take bribes with impunity, and allowed to sit on cases where there's a clear conflict of interest. Oh, and they're seated for life!

It's an unsustainable situation. I'm not sure why we're forced to go along with their rulings at this point. It is unrepresentative of the citizens of the United States. How can we call ourselves a democracy with this type of court in place?

I've been observing the latest generation and when they come of age, they're not going to tolerate this shit. They're not like us, quietly and obediently accepting atrocities. Heads will roll.

[dalton99a]

40. Make it 15.