I think the Republican Party (as it used to be) has been screwed tho. It’s just they are morphing in to the party of Trumpism
So, you think the SC still cares about consistency? (Serious question.)
I’ll try. Basically conservatives have been leading a multi decade effort to get rid of the Voting Rights Act. They’ve largely accomplished this without repealing it by winning SC cases which ruled that basically all restrictive and enforcement measures contained in the act were unconstitutional.
In broad strokes, they can do this because federal law is clear (as in, I think it’s in the Constitution itself) that the states get to enact and enforce the laws controlling their elections, even state-held elections of federal government officials. You can read this as just another appearance of the “state’s rights” argument used by conservatives since the civil war to weaken federal enforcement of civil rights and liberties at the state level.
These state’s rights arguments are also at the heart of the independent legislature theories currently making the rounds. Conservatives have worked very hard to ensure that they can stay in power even if the lose democratic majorities. They can do this by exercising plenary state control over elections.
Largely, conservatives have succeeded in these efforts. This case, however, would require them to go against this decades long effort to place state control of elections out of reach of the US Constitution. My belief is that the Republicans don’t need Trump to continue undermining democratic norms; he’s very useful in that regard, but they have been doing this successfully since at least Reagan (and that’s just because I’m being generous). The Republicans were winning this battle before Trump and they will continue to win after 2024 if people don’t get serious about the party’s fascist aspirations. I don’t think they will find it worthwhile to protect Trump at the risk of weakening their state level control of voting rights.
Sorry for not being brief. How this helps.
Edit: speling
Short answer, no. Their recent precedents show as much.
Like I said somewhere else, I’m probably high on copium, but i do think that Roberts, and maybe even one or two other conservatives, actually care about the reputation of the Court. There is no way to support Trump here and maintain any credibility (yes, i know they basically have destroyed that already). Simply, there is no good decision for Republicans here and that’s what i think is interesting.
It’s especially interesting because the one area where conservative justices DO care about consistency is when it comes to the state’s rights nonsense. It’s their go-to move for almost all conservative policy goals. The recent spate of SCOTUS overturning long established precedents have all involved cases where it was convenient for them to ignore existing precedents because it advanced some form of a state’s rights agenda.
Here they will be forced to choose between this agenda and Trump himself.
So, you think the SC still cares about consistency? (Serious question.)
These state’s rights arguments are also at the heart of the independent legislature theories currently making the rounds. Conservatives have worked very hard to ensure that they can stay in power even if the lose democratic majorities. They can do this by exercising plenary state control over elections.
Luckily, the independent state legislature argument was recently rebuffed by SCOTUS in Moore Vs. Harper.
I’ll try. Basically conservatives have been leading a multi decade effort to get rid of the Voting Rights Act. They’ve largely accomplished this without repealing it by winning SC cases which ruled that basically all restrictive and enforcement measures contained in the act were unconstitutional.
In broad strokes, they can do this because federal law is clear (as in, I think it’s in the Constitution itself) that the states get to enact and enforce the laws controlling their elections, even state-held elections of federal government officials. You can read this as just another appearance of the “state’s rights” argument used by conservatives since the civil war to weaken federal enforcement of civil rights and liberties at the state level.
These state’s rights arguments are also at the heart of the independent legislature theories currently making the rounds. Conservatives have worked very hard to ensure that they can stay in power even if the lose democratic majorities. They can do this by exercising plenary state control over elections.
Largely, conservatives have succeeded in these efforts. This case, however, would require them to go against this decades long effort to place state control of elections out of reach of the US Constitution. My belief is that the Republicans don’t need Trump to continue undermining democratic norms; he’s very useful in that regard, but they have been doing this successfully since at least Reagan (and that’s just because I’m being generous). The Republicans were winning this battle before Trump and they will continue to win after 2024 if people don’t get serious about the party’s fascist aspirations. I don’t think they will find it worthwhile to protect Trump at the risk of weakening their state level control of voting rights.
Sorry for not being brief. How this helps.
Edit: speling
Absolutely true. But wasn’t that holding centered mostly on the idea that state legislature control of election law cannot be placed outside of the scope of judicial review? And that federal judicial review should be deferential to state Court decisions applying state election law? Given the influence conservatives hold over state and federal judiciaries, it feels kind of like ISL is de jure dead, but de facto very much still alive.
These state’s rights arguments are also at the heart of the independent legislature theories currently making the rounds. Conservatives have worked very hard to ensure that they can stay in power even if the lose democratic majorities. They can do this by exercising plenary state control over elections.
Luckily, the independent state legislature argument was recently rebuffed by SCOTUS in Moore Vs. Harper.
In fact, state legislatures don’t even have to hold presidential elections: they can just appoint electors directly. It used to be like that in the 19th century.
Absolutely true. But wasn’t that holding centered mostly on the idea that state legislature control of election law cannot be placed outside of the scope of judicial review? And that federal judicial review should be deferential to state Court decisions applying state election law? Given the influence conservatives hold over state and federal judiciaries, it feels kind of like ISL is de jure dead, but de facto very much still alive.
What’s to stop them from being duplicitous in their ruling and saying something like “well in this circumstance only” which I have seen called a “narrow” ruling in the past to get around this? I mean why not have their cake and eat it too
I tried to answer this elsewhere, but i really don’t know. Bush v Gore is a narrow ruling like you describe, but that was saying that the US Constitution required the enjoining of state law. Here, a similar ruling would be kind of like sayingthe US Constitution requires that the US Constitution not be applied, but only in this case. That seems harder to narrowly restrict.
What’s to stop them from being duplicitous in their ruling and saying something like “well in this circumstance only” which I have seen called a “narrow” ruling in the past to get around this? I mean why not have their cake and eat it too
will SCOTUS have the ability to review whether Trump is qualified under section 3? Or will they only rule around the procedures of how CO came to their conclusion?
I tried to answer this elsewhere, but i really don’t know. Bush v Gore is a narrow ruling like you describe, but that was saying that the US Constitution required the enjoining of state law. Here, a similar ruling would be kind of like sayingthe US Constitution requires that the US Constitution not be applied, but only in this case. That seems harder to narrowly restrict.
will SCOTUS have the ability to review whether Trump is qualified under section 3? Or will they only rule around the procedures of how CO came to their conclusion?
So is your prediction that SCOTUS will throw Trump under the bus and save “States rights”?
I guess so, yeah. I view American politics as Republicans basically having their way for the last 40 years or so. Clinton and Obama were successful by bending to Republican demands, I don’t recall any Republican presidents needing to bend to Democratic pressure to enact their agendas. Trump has normalized their policies, but i don’t think they depend on him for success.
Of course, there’s a real chance I’m just smoking all the copium because I’m so tired of this fascist cheeto and terrified of him winning a second term.
So is your prediction that SCOTUS will throw Trump under the bus and save “States rights”?