Stuffing Supreme Court

I’ve heard that if Biden gets elected then he should stuff (change the justice count) the Supreme Court.
What would it really take? Does it require a simple majority on senate? Or is there a need to run this through HR?

 

FDR gave it a shot in 1937 but it didn't fly. It gets bandied about sometimes but I don't see it ever happening, my God look at what a circus it is to replace one of nine!

 

Maduro did it in Venezuela.

It ended real well.

 

I have no doubt that if Bumbling Biden won and the Dems gained both Houses of Congress, they'll try to "rearrange" SCOTUS so that it'll rule in their favor and to hell with what the Constitution says.

 

If Biden wins and Democrats win the Senate, you can be sure that it will happen. Both morally and politically they will have no choice. And it's a shame that it had to be that way.

The "least bad" way to handle it, I think, would be to add ten more justices, and elect them by popular vote.

 

So, all it takes is the simple majority of senate and the president to change justice count?
If it’s so simple and if Democrats do that, what makes you think republicans won’t change the number on their own next time they get a chance?
There got to be some additional control on this. How come HR doesn’t get involved?

 

The HR is us. You, me, joe schmoe down the street. We're the ones that have to get involved to prevent court packing.

 

You shouldn’t believe everything you hear.

 

I don’t. I’m just trying to figure out the probability of these things happening.

 

The House has no say on SCOTUS appointments.

I'm sure Republicans would do that. That's why I'm saying that they should add 10 and have them elected by a non-partisan popular vote, and then confirmed by the President and the Senate as a signal of good faith. Then it will be up to Republicans to show their own good faith.

 

Planning and implementing such system would require unprecedented cooperation between all branches of government.
So, while that all you wrote above is like a picture of a land with unicorns, in reality it will never happen.

 

One of the first thing that Fascist do is to pack the courts. Many of these appointed judges were grossly unqualified and The Bar Association attested to that.

 

Simple Congressional majority and the political will to make it happen. Also necessary: a strong sense of an outcome that doesn't necessarily result in a court arms race every single time government changes over. In this case that "long game" is the passing of HR1, which makes typical voter suppression efforts much rarer and less likely.

 

Only between the Presidency and the Senate. Nobody else has a say.

And the states, to manage the elections, but that shouldn't be much problem.

 

If 10 justices are added by popular vote, I would vote for candidates that are not judges. Preferably not even lawyers. Just very wise honorable citizens. There are those all over the political spectrum.

 

The president and the senate picks the supreme court justices according to the Constitution. The democrats accuse Trump and the republicans of shenanigans. . Now the democrats are trying to figure out ways to circumvent the Constitutional process.

 

If Dems take the senate, then it's a simple matter of Nuking the filibuster on legislation, then passing legislation to increase the number.

That's it, as far as I know.

 

The argument has always been 'they are afraid or politicizing the SCOTUS'

What's different now is that we are way past that, that horse has already left the barn.

America is in decline, but in order to save America, especially from a 6/3 right wing court, we might have to decline another notch ( politicize the court even more than it has been already go 7/6 dems ) in order to save her.

She is worth saving I'll always believe that. But republicans are hell bent on destroying her.

 

The Constitutional process was already dishonestly modified by Moscow Mitch. Now he wants to dishonestly modify it again. Democrats will not stand for it.

 

That isn't any more unethical than the Republicans making an excuse in 2016 to steal a Supreme Court nomination, and now want to do the exact opposite in 2020.

 

I agree with you. Honorable you say. Is that word even part of the vernacular anymore? Truth and integrity has been devalued by a portion of the population of this failed experiment.

 

Lay Justices by popular vote? Ohh, that doesn't sound good to me. No. no no.

We need people that have intricate knowledge of case law, and the fine art of framing opinions and rulings that can navigate through the Straights Of Megallan-esque legal issues, deal with the many objections and issues that will be inevitably raised, squarely, backed by president, case law, and the code, itself, so that when the ink hits paper, the rules last. You get layman up there, big mistake. Being honorable is not enough, this is a constitutional lawyer's terrain. The court is all about the constitution, and that is someone who knows about how this country came to be, all the arguments that Madison, Hamilton, Jay & Adair, et al, were discussing, we need justices who are intricately knowledgeable about all th federalist papers, and anti-federalist papers, (DeWitt, Henry, Smith) and then there is case law, TONS of it, how to work with clerks teaching them how to draft opinions, etc.

No layman is up to that task, it takes people like ginsburg to do it.

 

I can't be that cynical. I think there are honorable people around. I mean... there's Michelle Obama and then there's.... uhmmmm.... Give me a minute... I'm thinking... stop pressuring me!

 

After Daschle changed the rules. It does not change the fact that the democrats are trying to circumvent the Constitution by considering packing the court with enough justices so that they have a majority.

 

Michelle Obama lost me when she got all cuddly and cozy with war criminal Bush. I support the Progressives who are not on the corporate dole. I'm not cynical but I'm awake and the establishment Dem party is no longer working and advocating for the will of the people. I hope Pelosi's brilliant and "honorable" primary challenger crushes her.