A friend recently shared an analysis of the "Court-Packing" matter, which got me thinking about what would happen if the Democrats went ahead with the demands of the Angry Left's harridans, harpies, and hellions.
The control of the size of the court is one of the checks and balances.
Packing the court would seem to be an abuse of this power, but the left may feel it is justified because of Orangeman Bad. They believe that the seating of Gorsuch was done via an abuse of power, but if so then Trump would still have appointed two Justices, and the Left would only have four reliable votes.
The idea of the Court ruling that packing is unconstitutional raises an interesting question. If we believe that the 6 conservative Justices are strict constitutionalist then I would say they would allow the extra justices, but if/when the WH and Congress changes hands I have no doubt the Left would tie themselves into knots to rule a conservative packing to be unconstitutional, (stare decisis be damned.)
Read the link at the beginning. It goes into the nuance - whether the addition of seats is for "functional" reasons or whether it's politically motivated. There's an argument that, if the Court is overwhelmed with work (it's not, pretty clearly), Congress can say "we will add some Justices to help things along." But, a nakedly partisan move might trigger a separation of powers argument.
Again, I'm not a Constitutional lawyer, but I can see how such might play out.
As for Stare Decisis - the Court overturns on average one of its previous rulings a year - about a 2.5% rate.
“The aforementioned harridans, harpies, and hellions will nag and shriek and tantrum, of course, and insist that the voters put more Democrats into the Senate - Democrats ready to nuke the filibuster and start the doomsday chain reaction - but I doubt they'll get their way.“
Once again, ignoring the wisdom of two recently departed liberal members of SCOTUS.
An interesting intellitual exercise, but I'd guess Manchin would squash this.
And as the Constitution is silent on expansion of the court, I would venture to guess any challenge would be 0-9 or perhaps 1-8, thus upholding an expansion.
I think how they'd vote is a total crapshoot. I do think there's a separation of powers argument, albeit one that's as fraught and likely to produce a Constitutional Crisis as to be accepted.
But, yeah, I'm confident that this is just noisemaking.
I would wager that fewer than half of Americans understand what the term "packing the court" means. If we take the time to explain the concept and what would result, I imagine an overwhelming majority would agree it is not wise to do it, let alone even *consider* it. But as you say, we are currently protected against it by Senators Sinema and Manchin. As to your thought experiment wherein the Democrats packed to achieve a bare majority at 7-6...really! They wouldn't be pikers - they'd pack to create a huge majority - put at least 20 justices in there.
Well said. Given the fact Joe Biden didn't know what the term "court packing" meant on the campaign trail, I'm fairly confident a good majority of Americans don't either
The control of the size of the court is one of the checks and balances.
Packing the court would seem to be an abuse of this power, but the left may feel it is justified because of Orangeman Bad. They believe that the seating of Gorsuch was done via an abuse of power, but if so then Trump would still have appointed two Justices, and the Left would only have four reliable votes.
The idea of the Court ruling that packing is unconstitutional raises an interesting question. If we believe that the 6 conservative Justices are strict constitutionalist then I would say they would allow the extra justices, but if/when the WH and Congress changes hands I have no doubt the Left would tie themselves into knots to rule a conservative packing to be unconstitutional, (stare decisis be damned.)
Read the link at the beginning. It goes into the nuance - whether the addition of seats is for "functional" reasons or whether it's politically motivated. There's an argument that, if the Court is overwhelmed with work (it's not, pretty clearly), Congress can say "we will add some Justices to help things along." But, a nakedly partisan move might trigger a separation of powers argument.
Again, I'm not a Constitutional lawyer, but I can see how such might play out.
As for Stare Decisis - the Court overturns on average one of its previous rulings a year - about a 2.5% rate.
There are only five (possibly five and a half) constitutionalists on the court. Roberts willfully plays both sides. https://jeffmockensturm.substack.com/p/what-an-activist-conservative-justice
“The aforementioned harridans, harpies, and hellions will nag and shriek and tantrum, of course, and insist that the voters put more Democrats into the Senate - Democrats ready to nuke the filibuster and start the doomsday chain reaction - but I doubt they'll get their way.“
Which is what the move to make D.C. a state is all about.
And Puerto Rico.
Once again, ignoring the wisdom of two recently departed liberal members of SCOTUS.
An interesting intellitual exercise, but I'd guess Manchin would squash this.
And as the Constitution is silent on expansion of the court, I would venture to guess any challenge would be 0-9 or perhaps 1-8, thus upholding an expansion.
I think how they'd vote is a total crapshoot. I do think there's a separation of powers argument, albeit one that's as fraught and likely to produce a Constitutional Crisis as to be accepted.
But, yeah, I'm confident that this is just noisemaking.
I would wager that fewer than half of Americans understand what the term "packing the court" means. If we take the time to explain the concept and what would result, I imagine an overwhelming majority would agree it is not wise to do it, let alone even *consider* it. But as you say, we are currently protected against it by Senators Sinema and Manchin. As to your thought experiment wherein the Democrats packed to achieve a bare majority at 7-6...really! They wouldn't be pikers - they'd pack to create a huge majority - put at least 20 justices in there.
Well said. Given the fact Joe Biden didn't know what the term "court packing" meant on the campaign trail, I'm fairly confident a good majority of Americans don't either
I think thought experiments like this are good, regardless of their low probability of happening