The Supreme Court of the United States, the highest court in the land, is the final safeguard of our Constitutional liberties. Established under Article III of the U.S. Constitution, the Court has served for nearly 230 years as the final arbiter of our most pressing internal national conflicts.
From decisions we now deplore such as the Dred Scott Decision and Plessy v. Ferguson to more recent controversial decisions such as Roe v. Wade or Texas v. Johnson, agreeing or disagreeing with the result, Americans have accepted the Constitutional role and authority of the high court.
When the hotly contested Presidential election of 2000 saw advocates for both George W. Bush and Al Gore hysterically going for each other’s’ throats, the Court ruled 7-2 that the Florida Supreme Court violated the Constitution and 5-4 that the election was over. And it was over. The Court served its’ Constitutional purpose and Americans accepted the ruling and moved on.
Now, with a perceived 5-4 conservative majority, Democrats are no longer content with letting the Supreme Court exist as a co-equal third branch of government. Rather, they intend to weaponize it as they have weaponized so many other areas of government (The Obama/LBJ/FDR IRS’, the Russia collusion hoax, James Comey’s FBI, and the subpoenaing of Trump’s tax returns to name but a few). Democrats don’t appear willing to embrace a judicial body that merely calls balls and strikes. Rather they appear to prefer a super-legislative rubber stamp for liberal presidents and policies, a weapon aimed against the principles of a Democratic Republic.
Democrats have a long and demonstrated history of using the judiciary as a weapon. When democracy does not go their way, so called Progressives sprint to the courts in order to overturn the will of the people. The Ninth Circuit specifically, the court of the judicial family akin to that crazy drunk uncle you feel compelled to invite to the family reunion while praying he doesn’t talk to the children or ask anyone to pull his finger, has become the preferred weapon in the left’s judicial arsenal. So now it is no small wonder that Democrats want to mess with, and by extension de-legitimize, the Supreme Court.
Bernie Sanders, by no means a stranger to, shall we say, radical ideas, has taken the lead in finding new ways to weaponize and politicize the Supreme Court. In April he proposed, "What may make sense is, if not term limits, then rotating judges to the appeals court as well . . . Letting them get out of the Supreme Court and bringing in new blood." Senator Sanders doubled-down on this plan during last week’s Democratic debate, declaring, “We got a terrible 5-4 majority conservative court right now. But I do believe that constitutionally we have the power to rotate judges to other courts. And that brings in new blood into the Supreme Court and a majority, I hope, that will understand that a woman has the right to control her own body and the corporations cannot run the United States of America.”
In short, old Bernie envisions a Supreme Court that can be essentially appointed (or rotated) in its entirety, by the very president whose policies they will ultimately have to rule on. He said as much Thursday night when he made clear his deplorable designs. Get that straight. A candidate who has consistently called Donald Trump a dictator wants a Supreme Court he can appoint or rotate at will that will simply confirm the administration’s (his administration’s) proclamations. Hypocrisy at its finest.
Still, Bernie is not alone in his assault on the Supreme Court. Justices of the Court serve for life. They do not come and go at the pleasure of each administration, and for good reason. How can they be an independent co-equal branch of government if their very position is subject to blind acceptance of another branch’s whims. Yet Kamala Harris would like to see term limits imposed. Pete Buttigieg would like to see the Court expanded to 15 members. Cory Booker is “open” to discussing expansion of the nine-member body (though admittedly reticent that a Republican administration and Congress would do the same).
All of the current candidate’s for president, and most of their Democratic colleagues in Congress have, in one way or another, envisioned and expressed a manner by which to ensure the Court is nothing more than a partisan tool to blow with the wind of each and every administration. Presumably Democratic administrations. Not a safeguard of Constitutional freedoms or an independent body protecting against partisan posturing, but a body relegated to rubber stamp status.
To adopt any of the aforementioned policies, or for that matter, any policy toward the Supreme Court’s composition, made in haste out of partisan political desperation or expediency, would nullify the Court’s significance and negate its’ Constitutional role. Such is a recipe for disaster and an unconstitutional one at that.
Leave the Supreme Court alone. Be happy or unhappy with their rulings but accept them, nonetheless. Our Republic has survived for 230 years not in spite of our reliance on the Supreme Court, but because of it.