On it's face this is a very reasonable argument except that it is out of context. Donald Trump in conjunction with Mitch McConnell accelerated a long standing effort on the part of the Republican party to undermine the judiciary and make it into a partisan branch serving their party interests. This is now far more serious as Republican S…
On it's face this is a very reasonable argument except that it is out of context. Donald Trump in conjunction with Mitch McConnell accelerated a long standing effort on the part of the Republican party to undermine the judiciary and make it into a partisan branch serving their party interests. This is now far more serious as Republican State Legislatures are currently passing bills that not only restrict the franchise but also undermine the mechanisms of implementing free and fair elections. This is evident in Georgia where the legislature can now remove State election boards whose decisions they don't like and replace them *after the election* with ones that are more compliant. The only defense to save the democratic process should they act in this way would be the courts, but if the courts have been undermined, as we have seen in Hungary and elsewhere, they will not serve this function and will permit democracy to be subverted. A realistic discussion of the pros and cons of altering the Supreme Court and indeed the Federal Judiciary generally has to include a discussion of the role of such change in the preservation of a democracy under threat. -- As an example one of the reasons we are able to have this discussion in Constitutional Democracy is due to Harry Reed's willingness to use the "nuclear option" to allow Obama's judicial selections to be confirmed without a super majority.
On it's face this is a very reasonable argument except that it is out of context. Donald Trump in conjunction with Mitch McConnell accelerated a long standing effort on the part of the Republican party to undermine the judiciary and make it into a partisan branch serving their party interests. This is now far more serious as Republican State Legislatures are currently passing bills that not only restrict the franchise but also undermine the mechanisms of implementing free and fair elections. This is evident in Georgia where the legislature can now remove State election boards whose decisions they don't like and replace them *after the election* with ones that are more compliant. The only defense to save the democratic process should they act in this way would be the courts, but if the courts have been undermined, as we have seen in Hungary and elsewhere, they will not serve this function and will permit democracy to be subverted. A realistic discussion of the pros and cons of altering the Supreme Court and indeed the Federal Judiciary generally has to include a discussion of the role of such change in the preservation of a democracy under threat. -- As an example one of the reasons we are able to have this discussion in Constitutional Democracy is due to Harry Reed's willingness to use the "nuclear option" to allow Obama's judicial selections to be confirmed without a super majority.