Joe Biden worries that the “extreme” US supreme court, dominated by rightwing justices, cannot be relied upon to uphold the rule of law.
“I worry,” the president told ProPublica in interview published on Sunday. “Because I know that if the other team, the Maga Republicans, win, they don’t want to uphold the rule of law.”
“Maga” is shorthand for “Make America great again”, Donald Trump’s campaign slogan. Trump faces 91 criminal charges and assorted civil threats but nonetheless dominates Republican polling for the nomination to face Biden in a presidential rematch next year.
In four years in the White House, Trump nominated and saw installed three conservative justices, tilting the court 6-3 to the right. That court has delivered significant victories for conservatives, including the removal of the right to abortion and major rulings on gun control, affirmative action and other issues.
The new court term, which starts on Tuesday, could see further such rulings on matters including government environmental and financial regulation.
Yeah, the drafters of our constitution really fucked up in that regard.
I’d attempt to solve the problem by creating an independent judicial review board entirely separate from the US govt. similar to other “professional” professions. Let these judges go up for review every 5 years and if they are found to be in breach of conduct, remove them from the bench.
Also, rework how they get to the bench in the first place. Of course the SC is going to be politically motivated. They only get their seats because one of the two big parties literally puts them there. Impartiality is really hard to claim when you owe your entire existence as a SC judge to a giant money machine.
The thing is, the drafters of the constitution didnt mean for the supreme Court to be as powerful as it is today. There is nothing in the constitution that even grants them the power of judicial review. They just interpreted that they inherently had that power, and we’ve gone along with it for the last hundred years.
According to the drafters, separating the judicial branch from the executive was a way to inhibit veto power and to prevent the executive from reshaping laws that have been passed by Congress. There only other function was to handle cases between two states, and to oversee an impeachment trial in the Senate.
They probably never expected anyone in government to be so openly corrupt and incorrigible. At the time they wrote the declaration they probably viewed democracy like the roman Republic did and thought the people would categorically reject anyone willfully stealing their rights and freedoms for their own political or personal gain. Of course they couldn’t foresee a political party so openly hypocritical that they would literally lie on mass to a public brainwashed by unchecked “news” publications that only regurgitate what they want to hear. Democracy is f*cked, blame the murdochs.
It’s really a shame that so many seem to be clinging to a constitution that is close to 250 years old. You would think that some things would need to be updated over that period of time, but as I said, I’m from Europe…
Our constitution has been updated. Our current constitution is from the 90s. It’s just we update it in pain in the ass bits and pieces
Of course, I am aware that the U.S. Constitution has been updated several times and that any changes are a difficult political process (this is the case in every democratic country). From a European point of view, it is just difficult to understand why, for example, majority voting has still not been introduced and so on. In our system, it is unthinkable that votes are effectively devalued because the majority in one state disagrees. I understand, of course, that that was necessary some 250 years ago, so that electors could be sent to Washington to represent the will of the people of their particular state. But is that still in keeping with the times? To me, it seems antiquated - as does the attempt to guarantee independent constitutional judges by appointing them for life and thus - in theory - making them independent of political influence. I think that reality has shown that this is nothing but wishful thinking. Otherwise, a supreme justice like Clarence Thomas, who is obviously not only bound by his conscience, would probably no longer be in office. I just think that self-regulation has never really been effective - not in politics, law, or business.