The US Supreme Court and its decisions

Wheelimus

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Council of Elders
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I'll forgive her when she votes for a filibuster carveout for abortion and helps pass a new national law.
 

Dekafox

Fabulously Foxy Dragon
Citizen
They can interpret “this amendment allows legal abortion” into whatever they want because…no one can stop them!

Look at the second amendment. It’s written explicitly to allow weapons for militia service yet they’ve decided it means you can buy as many assault rifles as you want and conceal/carry them everywhere.
That militia statement has been argued over for a long time because of interpretation, true, but that's because of how it is phrased, and how definitions have changed over the years. This would be something modern, written by people looking to explicitly codify something. An originalist judge basically goes by "if it's not in black and white in the constitution, it doesn't exist" so by putting it in black and white that a right to privacy exists and confers these specific benefits, among others, they can't do anything but sit and spin.

Also re-read this quote from Fnu from earlier in the thread and stop assuming that the Supreme Court can declare Blue is Orange when there's a constitutional amendment that says Blue is Blue word-for-word, because there's a separate section where people are arguing whether blued steel is blue or grey.
Today's gun decision isn't that big a deal. They didn't strike down all requirements to get a concealed carry license, or anything like that. States can still require a background check, mental health check, training, whatever. Nothing like that got overturned. Maybe this court will go there eventually, but they haven't done it yet.

The issue with New York's law is it didn't define what its own requirements were, and their legal team had a hard time explaining it. One of their lawyers (possibly realizing they were losing their case) seemed to offer that if the court upheld the law they could make the requirements more clear. The court didn't feel like doing that kind of work so they struck the whole thing down.

That's just doomering, and only harms yourself and helps them.
 

CoffeeHorse

*sip*
Staff member
Council of Elders
Citizen
Today's decision is a very different beast. They just gave every extreme legislature the formula to repeal any other precedent they don't like.
 

Dekafox

Fabulously Foxy Dragon
Citizen
Yeah, I was pointing out that using the gun decision and this to say they can unilaterally ignore an amendment is false. If you're gonna fight something it's helpful to know what you're fighting and where the borders are so you know where to strike. They can repeal precedents, but they can't repeal amendments, which is why that really would be the best solution - but it's not feasible at the moment, and getting control of enough states (with a future eye to enacting it) would be a good path forward for those working within the system, since it cuts the SC out of it entirely. That's part of how things got to this point in the first place - certain parties focusing on getting control at the local and state level then leveraging it to break the Federal level.

For those who want to work outside it, well we got the 1968 Civil Rights act somehow, just saying...
 

Wheelimus

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Part of getting to a constitutional amendment will be taking over enough state legislatures to ratify it so that IS a great place to start. Right now we're running behind, Republicans control enough that abortion will be illegal in 26 states. We're going to have to whittle that down at least ten before any amendment would ratify anyway.

But we're STILL facing a bloodbath in November unless the price of gas magically comes down and inflation subsides. I don't see it. I think 2024 is the true swing back election, especially if Biden steps aside and someone better can run. Then we might see some real change. Until then it's going to be tough going.
 

Pocket

jumbled pile of person
Citizen
Unfortunately the first step was to get more true leftists onto the ballot instead of the blue dogs that are no doubt running in a lot of places, and the midterm primaries are all over. Actually the zeroth step was to make universal mail-in ballots a permanent institution, so that people who can't get a day off have the ability to actually vote, particularly in primaries. And we had a year and a half to push for that and I don't think it even crossed the Congressional Democrats' minds to make the attempt.
 

CoffeeHorse

*sip*
Staff member
Council of Elders
Citizen
Another alarming part of this is the Supreme Court didn't agree to take up the question of overturning Roe in the first place. Mississippi pulled a bait and switch here. They pretended they weren't asking for a repeal of Roe, got the Supreme Court to hear the case on those grounds, then got to the court and asked for a repeal of Roe. And instead of saying "We didn't agree to this. Go away." the conservative justices happily went along with the gambit.
 

MrBlud

Well-known member
Citizen
Also re-read this quote from Fnu from earlier in the thread and stop assuming that the Supreme Court can declare Blue is Orange when there's a constitutional amendment that says Blue is Blue word-for-word

No one can stop them.

Look at Andrus v. Texas. A lower court blatantly defied the Supreme Court and they let it stand because the result was favorable to them whereas they would’ve intervened if it wasn’t.

Nothing and no one is safe until the Court is expanded or three rightwing justices are impeached or resign.
 

Pocket

jumbled pile of person
Citizen
Also worth noting, for as much as I've gone on about strict constructionists, looking at the actual text of the rulings, none of these decisions have actually been based on that, and aren't even trying to pretend they are. And that's exactly what happens when the process of choosing justices becomes politicized: You end up with justices who talk more like politicians than judges with a background in law.
 

TM2-Megatron

Active member
Citizen
They can sleep very sound at night knowing that decisions like this piss people like you off.

That's the problem.

That suggests they have any regard at all for how ordinary citizens feel; which they don't. Corvus said it; they're psychopaths, pure and simple.

They sleep very soundly because they're wealthy and, by the rules of the society they've helped create, untouchable.
 

Anonymous X

Well-known member
Citizen
I’m really quite upset by this, even as someone who lives on the other side of the world and isn’t directly affected by this.* I mean, it’s a dark day for the demo democratic world that a plank of reproductive rights and secular legislation in the last remaining major world power has been torn away by ideological extremists.

* well, I’m not naive to think that the British Tory party won’t consider similar.
 

wonko the sane?

You may test that assumption at your convinience.
Citizen
If the US pulled it off, then the political monsters of the world even in "well established" democracies will attempt to emulate it. Hell, they're taking about abortion rights up here in canada, it wasn't even a question till recently.
 

The Mighty Mollusk

Scream all you like, 'cause we're all mad here
Citizen
They've been after this for a long time. It just took one sociopath to rip the mask off and stack the deck enough. And then wait to blame it on someone else, because hey, it happened under Biden, so it MUST be his fault that freedom is dying.
 

Cyoti

Member
Citizen
They've been after this for a long time. It just took one sociopath to rip the mask off and stack the deck enough. And then wait to blame it on someone else, because hey, it happened under Biden, so it MUST be his fault that freedom is dying.
Clarence Thomas's nomination was probably his fault since he was the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee and there was the whole Anita Hill allegations against Thomas that could have sunk him. I mean Biden does shoulder some blame there along with his current refusal to expand the current court.
 

The Mighty Mollusk

Scream all you like, 'cause we're all mad here
Citizen
Oh, I'm not even going to pretend he's completely blameless. But they're gonna dump everything on him now as a scapegoat. And while their base is shitslinging about it, they'll continue to do everything they can and more to keep tilting the system in their own favor. It's pretty much the entire conservative playbook.
 

MrBlud

Well-known member
Citizen
Can AOC be speaker of the House? Senate Majority leader, head of the DNC *and* President?

Asking for a Country…
 


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