Plans by Democrats to pack the Supreme Court could herald the beginning of the end. Excerpt:
We’ve been here before. After his landslide re-election in 1936, President Franklin Roosevelt proposed creating and filling additional judicial positions so that the Supreme Court would uphold, rather than strike down, his New Deal legislation.
Even though Democrats enjoyed enormous Senate and House super-majorities in the 75th Congress (1937-38), they rejected Roosevelt’s court-packing plan. The Judiciary Committee report on the bill said such court-packing’s “ultimate effect would undermine the independence of the courts” and “expand political control over the judicial department.”
The report’s arguments apply as much today as they did more than 80 years ago. Court-packing is simply “an attempt to change the course of judicial decision” by “neutralizing the views of some of the present members.” Disagreeing with some judicial decisions, however, does not justify destroying the judiciary itself. “It is far better,” they said, “that we await orderly but inevitable change of personnel than that we impatiently overwhelm them with new members.”
Once court-packing destroys judicial independence, it cannot be restored.
The political left in particular has relied on the courts to hammer out policies that they cannot gain through normal legislative means. President Trump has largely remade the Imperial judiciary, and has appointed two Supreme Court justices and nominated a third; the Left isn’t willing to let this stand.
To that end:
As abolishing the filibuster would undermine the Senate’s role as a careful deliberating body, packing the court would undermine its independence, and together these tactics would change the nature of our constitutional government.
With the Court’s independence gone, it would take on an even larger role in deciding fraught political questions than it does now. The temptation for a successive President whose party enjoys majority control in the House and Senate to pack the court further would likely be irresistible.
In a short time, the judiciary could largely supplant Congress as the chief legislative body. Legislative and constitutional questions would be decided, undecided, and re-decided with every swing of the electoral pendulum.
No government so unstable could last.
Packing the court will only ever yield short-term political victories at the cost of the long-term health of our Republic.
Forget long-term health. Packing the court would very likely come at the cost of the existence of our Republic.
Horrifyingly, the momentum in the Presidential race right now seems to be bending towards Groper Joe. He has implied that he isn’t in favor of packing the Court, but does anyone believe that daffy old Joe would be in control of the agenda, should he win the election? Not with Round-heels Harris a heartbeat away from the levers of power.
If he wins, Groper Joe would be well-advised to hire a food-taster.
Chuck Schumer (Sanctimonious Prick – NY) has said that if the Democrats take the Senate, “everything is on the table.” He’s advocating for the end of the Republic in the name of short-term political gain.
It’s a fine damn pass we’ve come to.
