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SCOTUS Reform

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Volkonski
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SCOTUS Reform

#1

Post by Volkonski »

President Biden to Sign Executive Order Creating the Presidential Commission on the Supreme Court of the United States

https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-roo ... ed-states/
President Biden will today issue an executive order forming the Presidential Commission on the Supreme Court of the United States, comprised of a bipartisan group of experts on the Court and the Court reform debate. In addition to legal and other scholars, the Commissioners includes former federal judges and practitioners who have appeared before the Court, as well as advocates for the reform of democratic institutions and of the administration of justice. The expertise represented on the Commission includes constitutional law, history and political science.

The Commission’s purpose is to provide an analysis of the principal arguments in the contemporary public debate for and against Supreme Court reform, including an appraisal of the merits and legality of particular reform proposals. The topics it will examine include the genesis of the reform debate; the Court’s role in the Constitutional system; the length of service and turnover of justices on the Court; the membership and size of the Court; and the Court’s case selection, rules, and practices.

To ensure that the Commission’s report is comprehensive and informed by a diverse spectrum of views, it will hold public meetings to hear the views of other experts, and groups and interested individuals with varied perspectives on the issues it will be examining. The Executive Order directs that the Commission complete its report within 180 days of its first public meeting. This action is part of the Administration’s commitment to closely study measures to improve the federal judiciary, including those that would expand access the court system.

The two co-chairs of this Commission are Bob Bauer, Professor of Practice and Distinguished Scholar in Residence at New York University School of Law and a former White House Counsel, as well as Yale Law School Professor Cristina Rodriguez, former Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the Office of Legal Counsel at the U.S. Department of Justice.
“If everyone fought for their own convictions there would be no war.” ― Leo Tolstoy, War and Peace
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pipistrelle
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Re: SCOTUS Reform

#2

Post by pipistrelle »

What, no Ammon Bundy and Kap'n Karl?
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noblepa
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Re: SCOTUS Reform

#3

Post by noblepa »

Most real reforms of SCOTUS will require a constitutional amendment.

Sure, Congress can, by simple statute, expand the court to 11 or 13 members, allowing President Biden the opportunity to appoint enough members to overcome the current imbalance in favor of conservatives. But, that is only a short term, one-time fix. It doesn't prevent a 13 member court from being dominated by seven members of one persuasion or another. This is also an extremely controversial option that would be seen by many as a political power play.

I would rather see a Constitutional Amendment, providing that Justices be appointed for a single, non-renewable 18 year term, staggered so that one seat becomes available every two years. This would mean that every presidential term, there would be two SCOTUS appointments.

Even this is not perfect. It doesn't actually prevent one viewpoint from becoming dominant. For example, imagine that two successive Democrats serve two terms each as President. This means that, at the end of the time, Democrats will have appointed eight of the nine justices. Then, two republicans serve two terms each. By the time that period is ended, all the democrat appointed Justices will have been replaced.

Of course, it hasn't happened in my lifetime that two successive presidents of one party both served two full terms. In my lifetime, we've had Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush (41), Clinton, Bush (43), Obama, Trump and now Biden. The closest we've come was Reagan serving two terms, followed by Bush (41) serving one term.

I would also like to see an Amendment that would REQUIRE the Senate to act on a SCOTUS nomination within 90 days of the nomination being received by the Senate. If they do not act, the nominee would be deemed to have been confirmed. For that matter, such an amendment should apply to all federal judges. During the Obama administration, Moscow Mitch blocked confirmation of many, many Federal District court judges.

Other than "packing" the court, what could Congress or the President do without a Constitutional Amendment?
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RTH10260
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SCOTUS Reform

#4

Post by RTH10260 »

unrelated to initial post but best fit
Ethical no man’s land: can the US supreme court be trusted to police itself?
The nation’s highest court relies on justices to judge for themselves if they have a conflict of interest. Often members of the hard-right majority decide they don’t

Ed Pilkington
Fri 24 Mar 2023 07.00 GMT

Last July Samuel Alito, one of the nine justices of the US supreme court, delivered the keynote speech at a gala dinner held in the gilded splendour of the Palazzo Colonna in Rome.

Alito ruminated on the “proud civilization” achieved by the Romans two millennia ago, asking himself how modern America would be remembered thousands of years hence. “As I think back, I also think ahead, and I wonder what historians may say centuries from now about the contribution of the United States to world civilization,” he said.

Alito did not specify which aspects of contemporary American life he deemed especially worthy of remembrance. One feature that would be unlikely to make the cut in many people’s estimation would be the ethical standing of his own court.

The justice had been flown out to Rome by the Religious Liberty Initiative, an outpost of the University of Notre Dame law school that advocates for religious freedom informed by the Catholic tradition. This was not the group’s first contact with Alito.

The initiative and its faculty have filed amicus briefs with the supreme court in at least six high-profile cases since it was founded in 2020. Two of the group’s fellows filed amicus briefs arguing against the constitutional right to an abortion in Dobbs, the case that led to the court overturning Roe v Wade in a contentious ruling written by Alito.

That the justice should be hosted in grand style by a religious freedom group that has lobbied him multiple times in the past two years raises serious concerns among ethics watchdogs.

“It’s one thing for justices to speak at law schools, but when the Religious Liberty Initiative, which is filing amicus briefs in all sorts of supreme court cases, flies Alito out to Rome, that’s another thing entirely,” said Gabe Roth, executive director of Fix the Court, a non-partisan group which advocates for reform.

But Alito’s Rome jaunt is just one of many factors that have swung an ethical spotlight over the nation’s highest court in recent months.

A series of ethical scandals have struck the court, the most toxic of which was the refusal of conservative justice Clarence Thomas to recuse himself from a case in which Donald Trump tried to block documents relating to the 6 January 2021 insurrection at the US Capitol from reaching the congressional committee investigating the riot.





cont. https://www.theguardian.com/law/2023/ma ... nce-thomas
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p0rtia
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SCOTUS Reform

#5

Post by p0rtia »

:callonme: :callonme: :callonme:
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