OT: Supreme Court vacancy - Printable Version
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Re: OT: Supreme Court vacancy - 81alum - 02-16-2016
OK...trying to restrain my own ideological bent here and attempting to put on my political science hat.
After the 19th C the Senate generally confirmed all well-qualified justices nominated by a President without regard to ideology. There was considerably deference to Presidential appointments.  Take 1986 for example. Antonin Scalia came up for confirmation in August, three months before an election. The Senate was 53R-47D. It confirmed Antonin Scalia 97-0. Democrats could easily have filibustered Scalia but that sort of thing just wasn't done then. As it turns out, had they delayed they would have had much greater influence over the choice, since the results of the 1986 election reversed control of the Senate 55D-45R.Â
Then the Bork nomination came forward the very next year. Democrats and some pro-choice Republicans feared that Bork would tilt the court against Roe v. Wade and some other critical (to them) issues. Thirteen months before the next Presidential election Bork was defeated 42-58. Bork was bitter and thought that Reagan had offered only tepid support in the final showdown--that even his friends had backed off for their own political reasons.Â
Just two years ago Scalia offered a rare TV interview in which he reflected on the confirmation process. He was the newest member of the SC when Bork went down. Scalia stated that he would not want to go through the modern confirmation process--that it had become too politicized. His reasoning though was thoughtful. He said that the process has become politicized only because the SC has been deciding political issues. Gay marriage, abortion, etc. he says are far removed from the Constitution and should be decided by the political process and not the judicial process. But when it becomes known that the SC will be deciding critical (in his view) political issues, then of course the membership of the court becomes politicized. I think the summary of his views are that if the SC operated according to strict constructionism then there would not be the fierce partisan wrangling about who would be on the court--the Court would be returned to the role of deciding cases that may have import in a technical sense on the law, but the big-ticket items that get people riled up over the SC would be off the judicial table.Â
My personal view as a theorist who studies the American constitutional founding is that strict constructionism is often (not always) a mirage--because the people who wrote the Constitution had myriad understandings of what it meant, and their disagreements were often intentionally papered over with ambiguous phrases and meanings within the document they wrote. The Classic example is Judicial Review itself, which is NOWHERE to be found in the Constitution, but was itself created by an act of judicial activism by the Marshall court. Hamilton wrote in the Federalists that judicial review was necessary and expected, but Jefferson hated the idea and reacted angrily after Marbury vs. Madison was decided--in his favor but setting a precedent he detested. (Of course Hamilton was barely there and Jefferson not-at-all when the document was written, but each had adherents in the Convention.) So what was the original intent? In any case, while I disagree with the foundation of Scalia's philosophy, I do think he is right to say that a SC populated with strict constructionists would in fact be substantially depoliticized. Imagine, for example, a SC without judicial review. How controversial would appointments be?
Well, the Bork episode pretty well established that the Senate was no longer going to defer to the President and would exert its own judgment about nominees. Thus it was mostly, but not entirely, Democrats who broke the long tradition of only opposing nominees that seemed manifestly unqualified. At the time I confess to thinking this was entirely appropriate. I had felt for a long time that the Senate had become much too deferential to Presidents and that the Constitution did in fact expect this deliberative body to deliberate and not simply to defer.
Which brings us to now. Republican Senators would be well within their rights to vote down an Obama-nominated justice that they regarded as ideologically extreme, just as Democrats decided to vote down Bork. Bork, after all, was highly qualified but simply ideologically unacceptable to Democrats, and this forced Democrats to oppose him openly on ideological grounds. Why shouldn't Republicans do the same today?
The decision not to allow any nomination to come up for a vote does indeed take this in a different direction. I think when the Senate uses procedural rules like this--or the filibuster--it feeds the cynicism and disgust the American people profess for "Washington trickery." In my view, Republicans would be far better off to have a serious debate over a nominee and then to vote her down on their version of the Bork argument. This would avoid the appearance of trickery and tradition-busting. I think that if the McConnell decision persists it will begin to resemble the government shut down which wound up costing the Republicans more votes than it gained them.
So why would McConnel opt for this course rather the the simpler, well established precedent of just voting down the nominee for ideological reasons? It won't change the outcome either way. I think he has calculated that taking the most extreme stance possible will play very, very well with the base Republican voters and will help to motivate them--to give money, to turn out, etc. This can become a campaign rallying cry to "save the Supreme Court." On the other hand, the option of playing by the traditional rules might make the Republicans seem more moderate and reasonable to independent voters, but McConnell must believe that anything to be gained among those independents is outweighed by the appeal of the "no compromise" philosophy to the Republican base.
Frankly, I think he is wrong, and I half expect that Republicans will figure this out and relent, offer a vote, and defeat the future nominee. Maybe they will do so right before the election.
Re: OT: Supreme Court vacancy - TrumpCard - 02-16-2016
(02-16-2016, 09:22 PM)ColoradoTree link Wrote:Ah, but what if a C.al alum is chosen as the sacrificial lamb, rejected by the Senate (Watford's confirmation vote was fairly close last time around), and Stanford alum Srinivasan (97-0 to the DC Circuit) sweeps in as the less objectionable backup? Some tasty C.al schadenfreude there, to be sure.
It would be Hoffpauir-ing the Supreme Court, which is something to which we all should aspire.
I'm not comfortable with a Stanford alumnus being the second choice to a kal alumnus. It's not the same as a recruit who picks kal as a safe harbor all while intending to select Stanford. Once Obama picks a nominee, it's out of his hands. If the GOP decides to fold, Obama could be stuck with his "sacrificial lamb" as the actual justice. Obama knows that, and so he should not pick someone he viewed as totally unqualified for the position. Hence, he should not pick a kal alumnus.
Re: OT: Supreme Court vacancy - 82 Card - 02-17-2016
(02-16-2016, 04:15 PM)garvin link Wrote:.... The entire tenor of this discussion is left of center. ....
I'm not convinced the center is where you think it is.
Re: OT: Supreme Court vacancy - 82 Card - 02-17-2016
(02-16-2016, 05:27 PM)Mick link Wrote:[quote author=ColoradoTree link=topic=14611.msg156636#msg156636 date=1455647492]
I think the problem is that for one of the two major parties, a functioning and efficient federal government isn't nearly as important as it is to the other. This is why Democrats will be at a disadvantage in any government shutdown fight, because a shutdown is catastrophic to a Democratic view of government (as a potential force for good in people's lives, as shutdowns mean that various programs Democrats find important stop helping people) but somewhat in service of a Republican view of government (as a restriction on individual liberty through onerous regulations and omnipresence in American lives), particularly since the military remains functioning during shutdowns.Â
Thus, a neutered federal government isn't a bug to many Republicans--it's a feature.
I don't think that's true. I think Democrats welcome the prospect of a government shutdown to show what mean, bad people the Republicans are. Didn't get your SS check? Republican fault. Long lines/shut down at the fill-in-the-blank government supported organization? Republican fault.Â
It's so, so, so easy to blame the Republicans during shut down time.
[/quote]
Every time a bill needed to be passed, the Republicans would come up with demands that they knew no Democratic president could agree to. The Democrats refusal to just roll over and give up everything they had accomplished in the last century for a temporary reprieve from Republican created crises does not make a shutdown a Democratic plot.
The Republicans have been intent on not making any deals. This is illustrated by the medical insurance brouhaha. The Republicans didn't like Hilary Care and came back with the Heritage plan. Obama figures that the right wing plan is better than nothing and adopts the Heritage Plan, which then becomes proof that Obama is a communist and not interested in consensus. The Democrats could agree to everything on the Republicans' agenda and it would not be enough.
Re: OT: Supreme Court vacancy - TreesAndBirds - 02-17-2016
(02-17-2016, 12:59 AM)82 Card link Wrote:[quote author=garvin link=topic=14611.msg156666#msg156666 date=1455664525]
.... The entire tenor of this discussion is left of center. ....
I'm not convinced the center is where you think it is.
[/quote]
Here is one indication of where the country is politically:
Senate 54R/44D
House 246R/188D
Governors 31R/18D
State Leg 31R/11D/8 split
President D
Re: OT: Supreme Court vacancy - CornFed - 02-17-2016
(02-17-2016, 01:29 AM)82 Card link Wrote:[quote author=Mick link=topic=14611.msg156674#msg156674 date=1455668874]
[quote author=ColoradoTree link=topic=14611.msg156636#msg156636 date=1455647492]
Every time a bill needed to be passed, the Republicans would come up with demands that they knew no Democratic president could agree to. The Democrats refusal to just roll over and give up everything they had accomplished in the last century for a temporary reprieve from Republican created crises does not make a shutdown a Democratic plot.
The Republicans have been intent on not making any deals. This is illustrated by the medical insurance brouhaha. The Republicans didn't like Hilary Care and came back with the Heritage plan. Obama figures that the right wing plan is better than nothing and adopts the Heritage Plan, which then becomes proof that Obama is a communist and not interested in consensus. The Democrats could agree to everything on the Republicans' agenda and it would not be enough.
Republicans were shut out of the process of putting together legislation on health insurance. Obama chided them at one point that "elections have consequences". Indeed, they do. Or they should. But in 2010 polls showed that more than 60% of Americans hated the approach that was being taken by Democrats on the issue. Across the country the 2010 election was a total rebuke of Obamacare. The election of Scott Brown to fill the departed Ted Kennedy's seat in deep blue Massachusetts was the final straw. He was a Republican who ran largely on the idea that he would be the vote to stop Democrats in the Senate and his election could not have been a stronger statement of how much people disliked the looming legislation. So what did Obama, Pelosi and Reid do? The ignored the election results and played parliamentary tricks in order to force their preferences on an unwilling electorate. It is upsetting to think that your take away from that is that the Republicans are obstructionist.
Re: OT: Supreme Court vacancy - burger - 02-17-2016
(02-17-2016, 02:20 AM)TreesAndBirds link Wrote:Here is one indication of where the country is politically:
Senate 54R/44D
House 246R/188D
Governors 31R/18D
State Leg 31R/11D/8 split
President D
Yet the House Republicans got only 52% of the vote in 2014 (and will likely be below 50% in the presidential election since Democrats can only be bothered to vote every four years). The gerrymandering that gave the Republicans such a big majority with such a small vote margin is yet another example of how modern political parties use means that are technically constitutional but outside the boundaries of good governance.
Also, the 46 D/I senators got 20 million more votes than the 54 Rs.
More importantly, over half of potential voters never vote. These folks are disproportionately in demographics that vote D--younger people, minorities, poor/homeless people.
Using numbers of elected officials to determine the ideological bent of the country is a silly exercise.
Re: OT: Supreme Court vacancy - 81alum - 02-17-2016
(02-17-2016, 02:20 AM)TreesAndBirds link Wrote:[quote author=82 Card link=topic=14611.msg156694#msg156694 date=1455695971]
[quote author=garvin link=topic=14611.msg156666#msg156666 date=1455664525]
.... The entire tenor of this discussion is left of center. ....
I'm not convinced the center is where you think it is.
[/quote]
Here is one indication of where the country is politically:
Senate 54R/44D
House 246R/188D
Governors 31R/18D
State Leg 31R/11D/8 split
President D
[/quote]
I think that is fair, and the fact that nearly 50% of active Stanford alums are from California probably skews the impressions of this board. I try very hard to convince my northern CA students that their personal experiences growing up in this area are often a hindrance to understanding American political culture as a whole.
The numbers of seats in the House, however, is deceptive. In 2012 the Democrats won 52% of all votes case for the House but the Republicans got a lopsided majority of the seats. In 2014 the Democrats were down to 48% of the votes but got only 43% of the seats. That is partly gerrymandering but it has more to do with the urban/rural distribution of votes. Democrats have become far more concentrated in urban areas, which is an inefficient way to distribute votes in a district based system. To give another example to illustrate this sorting of ideologies on the urban/rural line, in 1976 Jimmy Carter won a competitive election while winning 1700 counties nationally, while in 2008 Obama had a similar margin while winning 700 counties.
There is in fact an ideological shift brewing, and it has to do with age. The Hillary/Bernie split of young people is most instructive to anyone following Inglehart's "generational replacement" model for predicting changes in the political culture.
Re: OT: Supreme Court vacancy - 81alum - 02-17-2016
(02-17-2016, 07:18 AM)burger link Wrote:[quote author=TreesAndBirds link=topic=14611.msg156696#msg156696 date=1455700842]
Here is one indication of where the country is politically:
Senate 54R/44D
House 246R/188D
Governors 31R/18D
State Leg 31R/11D/8 split
President D
Yet the House Republicans got only 52% of the vote in 2014 (and will likely be below 50% in the presidential election since Democrats can only be bothered to vote every four years). The gerrymandering that gave the Republicans such a big majority with such a small vote margin is yet another example of how modern political parties use means that are technically constitutional but outside the boundaries of good governance.
Also, the 46 D/I senators got 20 million more votes than the 54 Rs.
More importantly, over half of potential voters never vote. These folks are disproportionately in demographics that vote D--younger people, minorities, poor/homeless people.
Using numbers of elected officials to determine the ideological bent of the country is a silly exercise.
[/quote]
Ooops, this came in while I was posting. Yes to all of that and we noticed some of the same things. But as I mentioned the gerrymandering, carried out at first opportunity by both parties, is only part of the problem. It does mean that the party that controls the most state legislatures had the gerrymandering advantage. But the Democrats have in a sense gerrymandered themselves out of seats by concentrating where they live so overwhelmingly in urban cores. That is the inherently undemocratic nature of all district based systems, rather than proportionate representation.
Re: OT: Supreme Court vacancy - CornFed - 02-17-2016
http://www-personal.umich.edu/~mejn/election/2012/countymaprb1024.png
The county-by-county depiction of red vs. blue is well known to all of you. The founders went to great lengths to protect the rights of those in the minority. Therefore, we have the Senate, based on regional equality, and the House, based on concentrations of population. This to me is just one of the beauties of our republic. Those who focus solely on the power of large concentrations of population play dangerously with promoting the tyranny of the majority.
Re: OT: Supreme Court vacancy - washingtonismoney - 02-17-2016
(02-17-2016, 08:03 AM)CornFed link Wrote:The county-by-county depiction of red vs. blue is well known to all of you. The founders went to great lengths to protect the rights of those in the minority. Therefore, we have the Senate, based on regional equality, and the House, based on concentrations of population. This to me is just one of the beauties of our republic. Those who focus solely on the power of large concentrations of population play dangerously with promoting the tyranny of the majority.
Well, some of the founders did. Madison and Hamilton, for instance, thought the Senate was pretty stupid.
And of course appealing to a purported tyranny of the majority is an easy principle -- but it's worth asking: when? why? for what purposes? for instance, preventing the tyranny of the majority from shutting down speech is very desirable. That's why the Bill of Rights is a good thing. Making sure corn farmers get their ethanol subsidies? Well, I've cherry-picked (corn picked?) favorable examples, but there needs to be some differentiation.
I would guess most advanced economies have a parliamentary system that are much more oriented to the majority. While I prefer living in the U.S. to other countries, I didn't perceive a tyrannical hellscape travelling through them. Why? I don't mean this facetiously; appealing to the Founders is all well and good, but it's not as if they came down from the mountain with the tablets. It was a product of many compromises, and a particular time and place. We shouldn't treat their words as holy writ, unalterable and unquestionable.
Re: OT: Supreme Court vacancy - burger - 02-17-2016
(02-17-2016, 08:03 AM)CornFed link Wrote:http://www-personal.umich.edu/~mejn/election/2012/countymaprb1024.png
The county-by-county depiction of red vs. blue is well known to all of you. The founders went to great lengths to protect the rights of those in the minority. Therefore, we have the Senate, based on regional equality, and the House, based on concentrations of population. This to me is just one of the beauties of our republic. Those who focus solely on the power of large concentrations of population play dangerously with promoting the tyranny of the majority.
Well, if the Founders meant to protect minority rights, they did a terrible job, didn't they? I mean, I suspect that blacks, gays, the Japanese in WWIi, Muslims since 9/11 etc. (i could go on all day here) would disagree with your statement.
More importantly, this is yet another example of how a constitution created for a rural-agrarian population 225 years ago is simply no longer suited to current conditions. I can't imagine that the Founders intended for the votes of rural people to count more than city dwellers--or are you really arguing that that's a fair and just system?
Just because something was created by the founders does not make it justified.
(Also, what WIM said while I was typing)
Re: OT: Supreme Court vacancy - CornFed - 02-17-2016
(02-17-2016, 08:29 AM)burger link Wrote:[quote author=CornFed link=topic=14611.msg156703#msg156703 date=1455721381]
http://www-personal.umich.edu/~mejn/election/2012/countymaprb1024.png
The county-by-county depiction of red vs. blue is well known to all of you. The founders went to great lengths to protect the rights of those in the minority. Therefore, we have the Senate, based on regional equality, and the House, based on concentrations of population. This to me is just one of the beauties of our republic. Those who focus solely on the power of large concentrations of population play dangerously with promoting the tyranny of the majority.
Are you really so jaded that you can only think of the term "minority" in terms of racial, gender, and other specified groups? I was referring to those (like me in this thread, apparently) that are in the minority on a given issue. It was, I believe, the founders effort to blunt the power of emotion in the conduct of national affairs.
Well, if the Founders meant to protect minority rights, they did a terrible job, didn't they? I mean, I suspect that blacks, gays, the Japanese in WWIi, Muslims since 9/11 etc. (i could go on all day here) would disagree with your statement.
More importantly, this is yet another example of how a constitution created for a rural-agrarian population 225 years ago is simply no longer suited to current conditions. I can't imagine that the Founders intended for the votes of rural people to count more than city dwellers--or are you really arguing that that's a fair and just system?
Just because something was created by the founders does not make it justified.
(Also, what WIM said while I was typing)
[/quote]
Re: OT: Supreme Court vacancy - martyup - 02-17-2016
(02-15-2016, 08:56 PM)stupac2 link Wrote:At this point I think it's best to just completely ignore ferrari on these politics posts. It's clear that his particular combination of ignorance and vehemence is wildly out of place on this board.
I think we are all adults on this board. This means that we can decide for ourselves who we choose to ignore. We can also decide for ourselves what is "out of place on this board," unless a post violates a specific board rule of engagement. In such case, the Administrator will decide.
I think we were properly warned by the Administrator about personal attacks.
Quote:I would like to draw everyone's attention to the board rules. Specifically, I want to focus on rule no 2, "attack ideas, not people."
I do believe that calling a specific member of this board (by user name) "ignorant" violates this rule and the spirit of this board.
Re: OT: Supreme Court vacancy - burger - 02-17-2016
(02-17-2016, 08:55 AM)CornFed link Wrote:Are you really so jaded that you can only think of the term "minority" in terms of racial, gender, and other specified groups? I was referring to those (like me in this thread, apparently) that are in the minority on a given issue. It was, I believe, the founders effort to blunt the power of emotion in the conduct of national affairs.
Now you're changing the subject. We're not talking about avoiding rash decisions--we're talking about a representational system that is, within many states, not at all representational. The current district system has nothing to do with blunting emotion; it simply rewards whatever party can control the state houses every 10 years (and thereby the redistricting process) and/or the party whose voters are less clustered. What does that have to do with blunting emotion?
It's possible that Republicans will control both houses of Congress in 2017 despite losing the popular vote in each (I believe this was also true in 2013-2014, though I don't know the numbers for the senate in 2012). Did the founders really intend for the party that gets fewer votes to be in charge?
Re: OT: Supreme Court vacancy - CornFed - 02-17-2016
(02-17-2016, 08:27 AM)washingtonismoney link Wrote:[quote author=CornFed link=topic=14611.msg156703#msg156703 date=1455721381]
The county-by-county depiction of red vs. blue is well known to all of you. The founders went to great lengths to protect the rights of those in the minority. Therefore, we have the Senate, based on regional equality, and the House, based on concentrations of population. This to me is just one of the beauties of our republic. Those who focus solely on the power of large concentrations of population play dangerously with promoting the tyranny of the majority.
Well, some of the founders did. Madison and Hamilton, for instance, thought the Senate was pretty stupid.
And of course appealing to a purported tyranny of the majority is an easy principle -- but it's worth asking: when? why? for what purposes? for instance, preventing the tyranny of the majority from shutting down speech is very desirable. That's why the Bill of Rights is a good thing. Making sure corn farmers get their ethanol subsidies? Well, I've cherry-picked (corn picked?) favorable examples, but there needs to be some differentiation.
I would guess most advanced economies have a parliamentary system that are much more oriented to the majority. While I prefer living in the U.S. to other countries, I didn't perceive a tyrannical hellscape travelling through them. Why? I don't mean this facetiously; appealing to the Founders is all well and good, but it's not as if they came down from the mountain with the tablets. It was a product of many compromises, and a particular time and place. We shouldn't treat their words as holy writ, unalterable and unquestionable.
[/quote]
WIM I don't think ethynol subsidies are the best example you might use to highlight misuse of the principle of tyranny of the majority. It is, however, an excellent example of how the centralization of power in the government distorts and perverts the will of the majority. It is a perfect case of how rent-seeking has grown so powerful and undermined the good of the country. I strongly recommend Charles Murray's book "By the People" for an articulate delineation of the outlaw nature of our government (Federal, state and local).
Much of this does ultimately devolve from the growth of political parties and their overwhelming power in our country. Someone referenced George Washington's farewell address in this regard and I wholeheartedly agree. The fact that the threat posed by factions was so crystal clear to him so long ago suggests he and his counterparts had insights to the dynamics of democracy that we now think we are too advanced and sophisticated to respect and regard. The notion that the Constitution is outdated and that we should pick and choose which of its fundamental principles should be kept and which ones should be updated to meet our preferred current priorities is just the trap into which de Toqueville said would be our undoing.Â
Re: OT: Supreme Court vacancy - CornFed - 02-17-2016
(02-17-2016, 09:10 AM)burger link Wrote:[quote author=CornFed link=topic=14611.msg156708#msg156708 date=1455724544]
Are you really so jaded that you can only think of the term "minority" in terms of racial, gender, and other specified groups? I was referring to those (like me in this thread, apparently) that are in the minority on a given issue. It was, I believe, the founders effort to blunt the power of emotion in the conduct of national affairs.
Now you're changing the subject. We're not talking about avoiding rash decisions--we're talking about a representational system that is, within many states, not at all representational. The current district system has nothing to do with blunting emotion; it simply rewards whatever party can control the state houses every 10 years (and thereby the redistricting process) and/or the party whose voters are less clustered. What does that have to do with blunting emotion?
It's possible that Republicans will control both houses of Congress in 2017 despite losing the popular vote in each (I believe this was also true in 2013-2014, though I don't know the numbers for the senate in 2012). Did the founders really intend for the party that gets fewer votes to be in charge?
[/quote]
I do think that they consciously avoided the possibility of states with concentrations of population running roughshod over the interests of the less-populated states. Isn't that why they came up with the Electoral College? Any effort to undermine the role of the Electoral College will result in greater majority rule, which is presumably a good thing, but it will threaten the minority's rights. They scrupulously tried to avoid that. It's also the reason they developed a bicameral Congress with one body based on equal state representation and the other based on population.
Re: OT: Supreme Court vacancy - ColoradoTree - 02-17-2016
(02-17-2016, 10:07 AM)CornFed link Wrote:[quote author=burger link=topic=14611.msg156711#msg156711 date=1455725437]
[quote author=CornFed link=topic=14611.msg156708#msg156708 date=1455724544]
Are you really so jaded that you can only think of the term "minority" in terms of racial, gender, and other specified groups? I was referring to those (like me in this thread, apparently) that are in the minority on a given issue. It was, I believe, the founders effort to blunt the power of emotion in the conduct of national affairs.
Now you're changing the subject. We're not talking about avoiding rash decisions--we're talking about a representational system that is, within many states, not at all representational. The current district system has nothing to do with blunting emotion; it simply rewards whatever party can control the state houses every 10 years (and thereby the redistricting process) and/or the party whose voters are less clustered. What does that have to do with blunting emotion?
It's possible that Republicans will control both houses of Congress in 2017 despite losing the popular vote in each (I believe this was also true in 2013-2014, though I don't know the numbers for the senate in 2012). Did the founders really intend for the party that gets fewer votes to be in charge?
[/quote]
I do think that they consciously avoided the possibility of states with concentrations of population running roughshod over the interests of the less-populated states. Isn't that why they came up with the Electoral College? Any effort to undermine the role of the Electoral College will result in greater majority rule, which is presumably a good thing, but it will threaten the minority's rights. They scrupulously tried to avoid that. It's also the reason they developed a bicameral Congress with one body based on equal state representation and the other based on population.
[/quote]
I've always understood that the Connecticut Compromise wasn't the Founders' broad vision of how government should ideally be, but a practical accommodation to the smaller states (which wanted equal state representation) by the larger states (which wanted proportional representation by population) in order to get a founding document that everybody could get talked into signing. In other words, it was a settlement. Something that got the parties moving forward again, but which neither side really loved. I mean, yes, it was a clever idea and got the job done, but it's not as if it was written on tablets handed down by God. I don't say that to demean its importance to the Constitutional structure, but to push back against the point that the newly sovereign states, speaking with one voice, had a unified goal from the beginning to protect minority rights by setting up this structure. In my view, it was more about each state fighting to maximize its own power, and the Constitution reflects a multitude of different viewpoints on what our government should be, and this was the only deal that could get enough people on board while preserving our nascent union. I think protecting minority rights was a side effect of the compromise, not its purpose.Â
Re: OT: Supreme Court vacancy - burger - 02-17-2016
(02-17-2016, 10:07 AM)CornFed link Wrote:I do think that they consciously avoided the possibility of states with concentrations of population running roughshod over the interests of the less-populated states. Isn't that why they came up with the Electoral College? Any effort to undermine the role of the Electoral College will result in greater majority rule, which is presumably a good thing, but it will threaten the minority's rights. They scrupulously tried to avoid that. It's also the reason they developed a bicameral Congress with one body based on equal state representation and the other based on population.
I was talking about districting in the House, which is supposed to be the representative body. But thanks to gerrymandering and the coincidence that Democrats tend to live in densely populated areas, the House no longer reflects voters' preferences. That has nothing to do with the senate or electoral college.
Also, you fail to appreciate the distinction (pointed out by WIM above) between not trampling on a minority and elevating a minority to power. The latter was surely not what the founders intended.
More generally, arguing that the system is just because the founders wanted it that way is not useful. They were just people, often forced to make bad compromises to patch together a new country from 13 colonies. It is not a coincidence that since 1789, very few other countries have followed the US example in developing their constitutions, and most that did so foundered.
Re: OT: Supreme Court vacancy - CornFed - 02-17-2016
(02-17-2016, 10:36 AM)ColoradoTree link Wrote:[quote author=CornFed link=topic=14611.msg156717#msg156717 date=1455728855]
[quote author=burger link=topic=14611.msg156711#msg156711 date=1455725437]
[quote author=CornFed link=topic=14611.msg156708#msg156708 date=1455724544]
Are you really so jaded that you can only think of the term "minority" in terms of racial, gender, and other specified groups? I was referring to those (like me in this thread, apparently) that are in the minority on a given issue. It was, I believe, the founders effort to blunt the power of emotion in the conduct of national affairs.
Now you're changing the subject. We're not talking about avoiding rash decisions--we're talking about a representational system that is, within many states, not at all representational. The current district system has nothing to do with blunting emotion; it simply rewards whatever party can control the state houses every 10 years (and thereby the redistricting process) and/or the party whose voters are less clustered. What does that have to do with blunting emotion?
It's possible that Republicans will control both houses of Congress in 2017 despite losing the popular vote in each (I believe this was also true in 2013-2014, though I don't know the numbers for the senate in 2012). Did the founders really intend for the party that gets fewer votes to be in charge?
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I do think that they consciously avoided the possibility of states with concentrations of population running roughshod over the interests of the less-populated states. Isn't that why they came up with the Electoral College? Any effort to undermine the role of the Electoral College will result in greater majority rule, which is presumably a good thing, but it will threaten the minority's rights. They scrupulously tried to avoid that. It's also the reason they developed a bicameral Congress with one body based on equal state representation and the other based on population.
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I've always understood that the Connecticut Compromise wasn't the Founders' broad vision of how government should ideally be, but a practical accommodation to the smaller states (which wanted equal state representation) by the larger states (which wanted proportional representation by population) in order to get a founding document that everybody could get talked into signing. In other words, it was a settlement. Something that got the parties moving forward again, but which neither side really loved. I mean, yes, it was a clever idea and got the job done, but it's not as if it was written on tablets handed down by God. I don't say that to demean its importance to the Constitutional structure, but to push back against the point that the newly sovereign states, speaking with one voice, had a unified goal from the beginning to protect minority rights by setting up this structure. In my view, it was more about each state fighting to maximize its own power, and the Constitution reflects a multitude of different viewpoints on what our government should be, and this was the only deal that could get enough people on board while preserving our nascent union. I think protecting minority rights was a side effect of the compromise, not its purpose.
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CT, I have really enjoyed your input on this thread and I agree in general with your points in this post. I think, though, that relegating the concept of protecting minority rights to an unintended by-product of a compromise on other matters is not correct. I certainly never intended to assert that the Constitution was the in any way the result of a unanimous (or even majority) vision on all its aspects.
But its ultimate achievement was indeed remarkable given the diversity of perspectives and intentions of those who created it. It could not be created today with all the special interests and the absence of trust and decorum. Look at the constitution that was created when the European Union was created. What was it, about 500 pages of minutia down to details about tariffs and I think even speed limits. An absence of overarching vision and a bureaucrat's dream.Â
And please folks, I am aware that there was political intrigue and strife among the founders. I know they played dirty in their ways too. But they managed to create a document that guided the formation and emergence of the greatest nation in history (unbelievably, I anticipate pushback about that assertion). I am cautious about being too cavalier in dismissing its provisions as out of date. It is amendable and has been amended, 27 times including the 10 that comprise the Bill of Rights, right? But it's really, really hard. It should be hard. But it would be better to make such changes through the legislature, and it would be preferable to avoid to the greatest extent possible making such significant changes via judicial interpretations.