Destroying the Court to Save it: Warren Calls For Packing the Supreme Court With a Liberal Majority

This week, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D., Mass.) finally buried her former persona as a law professor. In a transition that began in 2011, Warren has struggled with the demands of politics that often pit her against core legal principles.

Warren’s final measure of devotion to politics came in her Boston Globe op-ed where she called for the Supreme Court to be packed with a liberal majority. She justified her call by denouncing the court for voting wrongly on decisions and, perish the thought, against “widely held public opinion.” Of course, the Framers designed the courts to be able to resist “widely held public opinion” and, yes, even the Congress. Warren’s solution is to change the Court to make it more amenable to the demands of public (and her) opinion. Some of us have been discussing the expansion of the Court for decades. However, there is a difference between court reform and court packing. What Democratic members are demanding is raw court packing to add four members to the Court to give liberals an instant majority — a movement denounced by figures like the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Justice Stephen Breyer. Last year, House Judiciary Committee Chair Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass, and others stood in front of the Supreme Court to announce a court packing bill to give liberals a one-justice majority.  This follows threats from various Democratic members that conservative justices had better vote with liberal colleagues . . . or else. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., recently issued a warning to the Supreme Court: reaffirm Roe v. Wade or face a “revolution.”  Sen. Richard Blumenthal previously warned the Supreme Court that, if it continued to issue conservative rulings or “chip away at Roe v Wade,” it would trigger “a seismic movement to reform the Supreme Court. It may not be expanding the Supreme Court, it may be making changes to its jurisdiction, or requiring a certain numbers of votes to strike down certain past precedents.”Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer also declared in front of the Supreme Court “I want to tell you, Gorsuch, I want to tell you, Kavanaugh, you have released the whirlwind, and you will pay the price.”For her part, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y. questioned the whole institution’s value if it is not going to vote consistently with her views and those of the Democratic party: “How much does the current structure benefit us? And I don’t think it does.”Warren seems to be channeling more AOC than FDR. Roosevelt at least tried to hide his reckless desire to pack the Court by pushing an age-based rule. It was uniquely stupid. The bill would have allowed Roosevelt to add up to six justices for every member who is over 70 years old. Warren, like AOC, wants the Democratic base to know that she is pushing a pure, outcome-changing court packing scheme without even the pretense of a neutral rule.

Despite the fact that the Court has more often voted on non-ideological lines (and regularly issued unanimous decisions), Warren denounced the Court as an “extremist” body that has “threatened, or outright dismantled, fundamental rights in this country.” Those “fundamental” values do not apparently include judicial independence.

What is most striking is Warren’s use of a clearly false premise: that the Republicans packed the Court first: “This Republican court-packing has undermined the legitimacy of every action the current court takes.” She is referring to the Republicans refusing to vote on the nomination of Merrick Garland during the Obama Administration. Many of us criticized the lack of a Senate vote at the time. However, that is not court packing. It did not add seats to the Court. The Senate has the constitutional authority to vote or not to vote on a nominee. It was perfectly constitutional. What Warren is advocating is the addition of seats to the Court, which the Congress can do but most voters oppose as unprincipled and dangerous.

For Warren to call the Garland controversy “court packing” is all that you have to know about her column. She knows that that was not court packing, just as she knows that court packing is fundamentally wrong.  However, the Warren op-ed was her Rubicon where she crossed over from being a law professor to being a politician.

That transition has not been an easy one for Warren. As an academic, Warren was described as a “die-hard conservative” who was a leading advocate for corporations.  All of that had to go when she decided to seek the Democratic nomination for the Senate. Even more has to go if you seek the Democratic nomination for president (an even greater priority now as Democrats and media figures seek alternatives to President Biden).

Academics often evolve in their views of constitutional or statutory issues. However, Warren never made the transition from a corporate defender to an anti-corporate activist in her academic writings. It came largely after her entry into politics without an explanation of the reasons for adopting the new positions. The fact is that Warren had some interesting scholarship in the business law area and it would be equally interesting to understand why she has moved away from those positions.

That however was not enough. In the age of rage, one has to show that you are willing to do what others are not willing to do . . . like tear down the leading judicial institution in our constitutional system. If you are going to run in the Democratic primary, you need to be a “made” politician who has demonstrated that you can dispense with the niceties of the Constitution and do what makes others cringe. After all, how does the Court “benefit us”? Those other candidates may support higher taxation or spending bills but they are weaklings if they balk at packing the Supreme Court.

There is a sense of release in crossing that Rubicon. You are no longer burdened by the need to justify one’s actions in light of constitutional history or values. For example, during the confirmation hearing for Justice Kavanaugh, Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) demanded that Kavanaugh promise to respect stare decisis on cases like Roe, but then called for overturning cases like Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission.

It is the same glaring hypocrisy of democratic leaders like Warren denouncing the conservative majority as “partisan” while demanding the packing of the court to guarantee an immediate liberal majority.

The Warren column is perfectly Orwellian in declaring that the Supreme Court now “threatens the foundations of our nation” while using that claim to destroy our highest court. It is the judicial version of the explanation in the Vietnam War that “it became necessary to destroy the town to save it.” Warren would open up the Court to continual manipulation by shifting majorities in Congress — recreating the Court in the image of our dysfunctional Congress.

So, on December 15, 2021, Elizabeth Warren finally transitioned to being a pure politician unburdened and unrestrained. From “Tax the Rich” to “Pack the Court,” Warren is now soundbite ready and principle resistant for 2024.

 

237 thoughts on “Destroying the Court to Save it: Warren Calls For Packing the Supreme Court With a Liberal Majority”

  1. What are all of you Trump snowflakes worried about? It’s a sure bet, your Dear Leader would be calling for the elimination of the SCOTUS anyway. He sure didn’t believe in judicial independence with the way he treated the Justice Department, and the legislative branch, and the Cabinet. The law was just to be ignored, or a hindrance to the Dear Leader. Example, see January 6th 2021.

  2. Lamenting Warren’s loss of principle now? I’m giggling pretty hard. I don’t know Prof Turley, I tend to think she revealed she had no principles when she represented herself at native American to gain privileges as a lawyer and academic – in other words, very early in her career. She then went on to shake down insurance companies primarily and was seen as a champion of consumers but in reality she worked with corporations to ‘help’ them comply and that’s how she made her money. She’s always been a slimeball. But then again, many Leftist lawyers are slimeballs so perhaps it’s hard for Turley to distinguish her from the feral pack of lying hacks on the Left legally.

  3. As to Lie-awatha’s “persona” at a law school … While attending law school, we could easily identify the profs who taught because they could not practice in the real world. Moreover, some law school grads can only be identified as lawyers, not attorneys, because the latter have clients. Lie-awatha is a sad example of a law degree conferring nothing on the recipient.

  4. Pedo rings at CNN and the Lincoln Project, and CNN’s legal correspondent, Jack Inhoff, has yet to comment. QAnon would be nothing without these guys.

  5. “How much does the current structure benefit us?” (AOC)

    “us” = socialists

    “benefit” = help us achieve total control

  6. “What is most striking is Warren’s use of a clearly false premise: that the Republicans packed the Court first: “This Republican court-packing has undermined the legitimacy of every action the current court takes.” She is referring to the Republicans refusing to vote on the nomination of Merrick Garland during the Obama Administration. Many of us criticized the lack of a Senate vote at the time. However, that is not court packing. It did not add seats to the Court.”
    *******************************
    The first casualty of war is the truth. We’re in a war and those who wage it are consumate liars and hypocrites. Lieawatha as exhibit A. What would you call an enemy who lies, fights dirty and doesn’t care about anything except winning? Why an “enemy,” of course. Time to marshal the forces and fight ’em where they live. Volunteer, run for elected office and vow never to vote for any Dimocrat again. It’s now a patriotic duty.

  7. Many moons ago Sen. Warren, aka Pocahontas assembled a war party. Ambush great white eyes in Wash DC. Have many Comanche torture tricks. No smoke peace pipe.

    1. Oh, and slavery only existed because it was started by African tribal chiefs who sold their own people for money.

  8. Garland/Gorsuch tussle has a lot of leftists in a twist.

    But the never admit that McConnell went all in trying to fill an inside straight. That he won the pot, is one for the ages. Nobody believed Trump could win. And of course, Obama could have negotiated. He could have pulled Garland, and went with a moderate that 10 Republicans would have supported. But no. Obama also doubled down. But Obama was playing with house money, he was on the way out and had no skin in the game.

    1. Nobody believed Trump could win: damn right–because he didn’t win–he cheated, with the help of Russian hackers and he lost the popular vote. You are laughably criticizing Obama for nominating Garland, implying that he’s some kind of left-wing radical, and that he could or should have nominated someone more palatable to Republicans. You don’t know what you’re talking about. Garland IS middle of the road, and has an excellent reputation for being a scholar. It wouldn’t matter who Obama nominated: McConnell wouldn’t have allowed the judge to be voted on. That’s a fact. Republicans had a chance to prevent Obama from making a nomination and they took it. And, it’s also a fact that Barrett, Gorsuch and Kavanaugh are NOT middle of the road–they are right-wing radicals, and THAT’s why they were nominated.

  9. The objective of Warren’s proposal is simply to enable those with her current opinions to change the orientation of the court to suit themselves. It is not based on any principled view that nine is too few to be effective or that there should be a mandatory retirement age. Nothing could be more calculated to result in tit for tat changes forever into the future.

    It is no answer to say “what about Garland”? There is a long tradition in the Senate of avoiding confirmation late in a President’s term when the Senate and Presidency are controlled by different parties. It always is a calculated gamble. If Clinton had defeated Trump, there was a real risk that a candidate even more acceptable to the left would have been nominated and confirmed. Senate leadership won the gamble, against the odds.

    The real difficulty with the court is that the Justices tend to read into the constitution the values they have. This goes very deep. When the 14th amendment was adopted it was very clear that it was not meant to outlaw segregated schools or to implement equivalent weight voting. Anyone who thinks otherwise should read Berger’s book on rule by the judiciary. It also was not meant to outlaw anti-abortion legislation. Very little in any of the court’s substantive due process decisions can be justified by the original understanding of the 14th amendment. Nor, in my view, are the court’s decisions in Heller and MacDonald supported by an honest reading of the text of the 2nd amendment; de-linking the first clause from the second was an exercise in interpretive sleight-of-hand to get to a particular result.

    But once the Justices start down the road of reading their own preferences into the constitution, it is impossible to draw a line that those with other views can accept. If, for example, you think interpreting the constitution to prohibit state action based on race would be acceptable to today’s left, and many others as well, you are delusional — just look at the practices implemented by our entire political, educational and corporate establishments in the areas of affirmative action through preferential admission, hiring, promotion, retention and set-asides.

    None of this should be constitutional, in my view. Moreover, the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as originally conceived, should also outlaw these practices – they were initially adopted by the executive and judiciary branches despite clear language to the contrary in the statute, and have since become private sector orthodoxy as well.

    Yet I must admit that there is nothing in the constitution that expressly prohibits the political branches from taking race into account to promote equality of outcome between groups (and some on the left would say doing so is permitted if not mandated by the concept of “equal protection of the laws”). And decades of implementation of the Civil Rights Act have countenanced the practices it appears to outlaw. Nonetheless, I would like to see the court assert itself here, because I think the colourblind principle is critical to both justice and political stability. It is also a clear concept readily susceptible to judicial management.

    So all we can ask of the Justices is that they recognise that there is little in the constitution that authorises them to remove from the political process many of the areas in which they have asserted or would like to assert their authority, and that, as a result, where the constitution is most general, they should act only on the most fundamental matters, that when they act they should do so in a principled way that is judicially manageable, and that they should explain clearly the actual reasons for their decisions. This way of proceeding will not be encouraged by court packing to promote one political view or another. Quite the opposite.

    1. Dan: Well stated. Also, seems that some justicies will render a verdict based on their position of personal desire for the society.

      1. Yes, I agree. I include that in the idea that the Justices import their own values into the constitution.

        1. Dan: I thought your original comment was well-written and thought provoking. However, I must slightly disagree with your follow-up comment in which you opined that the Justices “import their personal values into the Constitution. If Amercians believe that, then we will end up with a very political Court. More likely, the Justices differ in whether they are “textualists,” i.e., they attempt to understand/ interpret the Constitution in a way reflective of the original drafters, or whether they believe in a “living Constitution” that evolves with the times… This, in my opinion, is the real difference, and I also believe that The Chief Justice has done well in navigating that course.

          1. Dan, it’s me-lin. I hit the wrong button and this posted as “anonymous.” So if you disagree, at least you know whom you are disagreeing with)

            1. Thanks, Lin. Though I prefer textualists, or proponents of the original understanding, I do not believe they practice what they preach. I think Scalia grossly distorted any fair reading of the 2nd amendment when he disassociated the right to bear arms from the express goal of states’ maintaining a well-regulated militia. The 2nd amendment is most reasonably read as a provision intended to preserve the ability of states to maintain militias in the face of feared encroachment by the new Federal government that was then being established. The court read this purpose out of the amendment and instead substituted its own value of preserving an individual’s right to self-defence in his home, which is nowhere mentioned in the text. I also believe that no proponent of the original understanding would propose overturning Brown, even though it is very clear that the issue of school segregation was understood to be outside the scope of the protections afforded by the 14th amendment by those who adopted it. Berger’s thorough analysis is dispositive on this, it seems to me. Some applications of substantive due process, for example, the right to use contraceptives within a marital relationship, discovered in the penumbras and emanations of several different amendments, are also unlikely to be overturned by originalists, even though they have no basis in text or original understanding. So, if the past is prelude, the originalists will continue to innovate, though they will pretend they are not doing so. One area I hope they will act on is to eliminate the widespread practice of racial preferences by adopting the principle that the constitution prohibits any kind of racial discrimination by state actors and that the Civil Rights Act of 1964 applies the same rule to private actors. But neither the constitution nor the courts have ever said this, so it is hard to square with textualist or original understanding jurisprudence (though a strong case can be made that this in fact was the express and understood meaning of the Civil Rights Act, before the distortions quickly brought about by the executive and judicial branches).

              1. “The conception of the militia at the time of the Second Amendment’s ratification was the body of all citizens capable of military service, who would bring the sorts of lawful weapons that they possessed at home to militia duty,” _Scalia

                I think at the time it was the obligation of the people to supply the arms. Therefore, it was important for individuals to own, keep and bear their own weapons. That conforms to the wording, “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”

                1. True, but the militias no longer depend on weapons owned by a state’s citizens, so the amendment should be a dead letter, rendered irrelevant by history. Instead, Scalia in effect discarded the purpose clause, and instead read into the amendment the concept of individual self-defense, which isn’t there. He then revived the purpose clause in his discussion at the end but only to confirm that his newly minted right of individual self defense was not inconsistent with it. Hardly a model of textualism.

                  1. “True, but the militias no longer depend on weapons owned by a state’s citizens, so the amendment should be a dead letter, rendered irrelevant by history. ”

                    But it isn’t dead, because owning weapons was expected. I think people get confused over what a militia meant then vs. what it means now. “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed” is clear both historically and legally. The purpose stands legally and historically. People were individuals and expected to protect themselves. Many would like to create a purpose for something that existed naturally.

                    1. Well, it seems to me the first clause states the end and the second the means. Once the end ceases to be served by the means, as a result of historical developments, the entire construct ceases to have any significance, unless you want to make up some other end.

                      Had the first clause not been there, the construct would have had a completely different meaning, but it is there. And the reason it is there is that the states feared that the new Federal government would supplant their armed forces by disarming the people who would be mustered into them. That is why the amendment was adopted. Textualists and originalists should be guided by the understandings of those who frame and adopt the clauses under consideration.

                      If the 2nd amendment had been meant to protect a right of an individual to bear arms in self-defense, the construct would have been written very differently.

                    2. Daniel, I look at things from a different perspective than you. What was the reason for The Bill of Rights? Supposedly the Bill of Rights wasn’t necessary. The federal government’s rights were enumerated. Nowhere did the federal government have the power to interfere with the individual right to bear arms.

                      Wouldn’t it be unthinkable at that time to infringe on the right to bear arms? Man and his weapons were inseparable and necessary. Isn’t that a good reason not to deprive man the weaponry to protect himself? I believe that was one of the arguments by the Federalists to the Anti-Federalists who were afraid a federal government would restrict his rights.

                      The Bill of Rights was written to satisfy these existing fears. Perhaps you believe the Second Amendment’s passage was a ruse specially worded so that a new federal power was created which could deny the right to bear arms at a later date? I think that denies historical context.

                      Let’s think about what was in people’s minds at that time. You might believe that the right to bear arms is a derivative from militias being necessary for the “security of a free state.” (one following the other). Such a notion did not exist when the Bill of Rights was written. Both the Federalists and Anti-Federalists agreed that 1) the state needed to control the army and 2) the government should not disarm the citizen. To my interpretation, that is what the Second Amendment states: 1) “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State,” 2) “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”

                  2. Dan: “the amendment should be a dead letter, rendered irrelevant by history”

                    +++

                    Recent history of police neutered, violent criminals released from prison, assaults and looting, and an open border make the Second relevant even to leftists whose policies led to their feeling unsafe in their McFortresses.

                    1. The desire of citizens to be able to use arms to defend themselves in violent cities has nothing to do with a state’s ability to maintain a well-ordered militia by calling on an armed citizenry. The latter is what the 2nd amendment dealt with. And it is the latter that has been rendered a dead letter by historical developments. If the former is to be given legal protection, that is a matter for the political process to determine; the constitution simply does not deal with it.

                  3. Would the Constitution have been ratified if your view was prevalent at the time?

                    What you argue is that the framers employed a bait and switch by modifying the plain language of the last two clauses “…the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed[.]”, with the first two clauses “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, … to only secure the states’ right to armed defense.

                    However, the amendment can also be read another way, which secures both the right of a state to form armed military units for its collective defense as well as a citizen’s individual right to bear arms for their own self-defense. You seem to be under the impression that, at the time, individual citizens had no need to be armed for self-defense. That is categorically false.

                    The law was near non-existent in many places — tales of robbers and bandits abound. Indian raids were common on the frontier. (There is a story in my family about one of my great-great-grandmothers hiding in a flour barrel during a Comanche raid, which resulted in the deaths of her husband and two eldest sons.) Settlers required firearms for hunting and protection of life and livestock from wild animals.

                    Moreover, the Revolution was recent history, as was the French and Indian War, with all the misery both visited upon the (now former) colonists.

                    If no individual right is secured by the Second Amendment, why was private firearms ownership not outlawed or otherwise restricted by Congress following the Whiskey Rebellion?

                    1. The issue that the 2nd amendment dealt with was the fear that the new Federal government would remove the armed forces the states commanded by disarming their citizens. As S Meyer pointed out, the reality at the time was that the states were entirely dependent on an armed citizenry to form their militias. So the amendment was drafted to ensure that the Federal government could not eliminate this source of armed power. To the extent individuals enjoyed rights to bear arms for other reasons, under the common law or state law, those rights were not dealt with in the 2nd amendment.

                    2. To the extent individuals enjoyed rights to bear arms for other reasons, under the common law or state law, those rights were not dealt with in the 2nd amendment. — Daniel

                      We disagree… based upon the plain language of the amendment itself.

                      As S Meyer pointed out, the reality at the time was that the states were entirely dependent on an armed citizenry to form their militias. So the amendment was drafted to ensure that the Federal government could not eliminate this source of armed power. — Daniel

                      Let’s rewrite this, slightly, for clarity…

                      The reality at the time was that the states were entirely dependent on an armed citizenry to form their militias. So the amendment was drafted to ensure that the Federal government could not infringe upon the right of state citizens to own and bear arms.

                    3. Spanky: I had to leave yesterday but wanted to tell you that I thought you raised very valid counter-opinions to “Daniel” (as did S. Meyer and a few others) but today is too late because the blog has moved on to new topics. I think Dan brings to the blog some well-articulated and well–written statements, but they appeared somewhat equivocal. You and Seth did a great job pointing out the arguments that Dan left out. And I generally agree with the points you are making. The only way I can support Dan’s comments on the 2nd amendment is to infer that he is simply saying that the 2nd amdt does not expressly address the right to bear arms outside of the “militia” application. I do not believe that he was objecting to the right to bear arms in general. You will note that I potentially disagreed with him on Scalia/Heller. I say “potentially” because I am not sure whether he was simply criticizingwhat he saw as an expansion or rights, or whether he was just disappointed with the way Scalia justified the decision. As you know, for example, all the Court’s decisions about a CONSTITUTIONAL right to privacy are not in the Constitution either…This is why I likely agree with your thinking (and S. Meyer and a few others). In any event, time to move on for now, and thank you for your good throw-back arguments.

                    4. Spanky: the Dec17 9:15 comment from Anonymous is from me-lin. (My iPad tends to post things immediately if my fingers are even slightly touching two keys rather than one.) Thanks again for your good comments

                    5. “The issue that the 2nd amendment dealt with . . .”

                      Not “the” issue — *an* issue. There’s all the difference in the world.

                      The Bill of Rights is not a list of permissions of how an individual can *use* a right. It merely lists, in principled form, *some* of the rights individuals possess, and stresses that government cannot infringe them. It is a bizarre interpretation of the purpose of the Constitution to claim: 2A protects the use a gun when you’re a member of the militia, but not the use of a gun to defend yourself, hunt, target shoot, . . .

                      That 2A names *a* reason why gun ownership is important, does not imply that it is the *only* justification for gun ownership.

                      The notion that 2A is a “collective” right is an anti-historical and illogical interpretation. The Founders were motivated by a desire to protect *individual* rights, and their guiding political philosophy was individualism. The entire Bill of Rights, including 2A, codifies some of those individual rights.

              2. Dan: What a pleasure it is to comment and respond to someone (you) who knows what he is talking about. Your comments likely reflect what the good professor had hoped for by opening/providng this forum. As to the substance of your immediate ccomments/opinions, I wish I had the time to ponder them and agree or differ, but, alas, Holiday season is upon us, and I have insufficient time to do so. Notwithstanding, whenever I see your name on a comment posted here in the future, I will know it will be worth reading and considering. So don’t change your name! Thanks for what you add to this blog, p.s. I might respectfully disagree with you over Scalia’s Heller opinion….

    2. Daniel:

      “Nor, in my view, are the court’s decisions in Heller and MacDonald supported by an honest reading of the text of the 2nd amendment; de-linking the first clause from the second was an exercise in interpretive sleight-of-hand to get to a particular result.”
      ********************
      Anyone understanding the history of the right to keep and bear arms starting with Alfred the Great and his efforts to form a national militia down to the Bill of Rights of 1689 when the right became a personal right of Englishment would disagree with your view. You can read my brief history here for clarification:

      https://jonathanturley.org/2011/01/16/their-rights-as-englishmen-a-brief-history-of-the-second-amendment-part-i/

        1. -But Dan does raise (as you do) intelligent, worthy arguments instead of all this irrelevant anti-Turley, anti-Trump nonsense. That’s why I appreciate comments like his, because it makes others (like you) better able to form and express response to him.

  10. Expanding SCOTUS is simple.

    Every Presidential term gets one SCOTUS nominee. If we need 4 more, 6 more, we will just add them one every term.

    Once we get to the new number, the longest serving justice, not he oldest, will move to the SCOTUS Senior bench. From there they can fill in on recusals, death, or illness.

    This attains the goal Warren, supposedly, claims she wants.

    I doubt either side would agree to something that takes so long to implement and offers no political advantage.

  11. Foundational assumptions matter. The left no longer believes that this government is based god-given rights and that it’s purpose is to protect the lives, liberty and property of the people, from whom its legitimate powers are derived. Once these beliefs are thrown overboard, all politics and governmental policy are determined by power, and antique structures no longer serve their purpose because their purpose has been discredited.

  12. Well, we’ve destroyed the Senate with the 17th amendment, why not the SCOTUS. Then on to the House and POTUS.

  13. Typical Democrat. The legislature makes the laws, and she is part of that legislature. She failed in her duty and now blames the Supreme Court. Of course, it is all politics. That is what Democrats are all about, politics and controlling people. That is why she wishes to control the Supreme Court as well.

    1. Typical S. Meyer, being myopic seems to be the standard.

      “ The legislature makes the laws, and she is part of that legislature.”

      She is part of the senate which is part of congress. The constitution grants the senate the right to increase the size of the court if it wishes or deems necessary. Whether that involves “packing” the court with more liberal or conservative justices is up to them and it IS constitutionally permissible.

      Conservatives also want to control the court and that is why they packed the court with more conservative justices, so it would do what they wanted, overturn Roe. How is that any different than democrats wanting to do the same by legally increasing the size of the court which Turley supports.

      1. Nominating and confirming ‘conservative’ justices when a vacancy arises, is not packing the court. Adding additional justices to change the philosophical leanings of the court, is court packing.

      2. “She is part of the senate which is part of congress. “

        Svelaz, I probably should have made it clearer, but there are three branches. The legislative branch includes the Senate and House. You should know that.

        Once again you are using packing the court ignorantly. What do we do with a person who makes the same mistake over and over again. Maybe Svelaz’s intellect doesn’t permit him the ability to distinguish court packing form the normal partisan nomination of judges.

  14. Check out the urgency in the leftists demands.

    They MUST declare every hangnail a constitutional emergency. Leftist require emergencies to govern. That last 2 years have proven that out. Leftist always fail to advance their agenda through Congress. Their only path is legislation through SCOTUS. Remember, it was SCOTUS that shut down FDR…until they too, bowed to the emergency. Thus dragging our a recession to a full blown depression.

  15. Senator Warren HAS NO ETHICS where the law is concerned. She is fundamentally AGAINST THE LAW and the stability of the judicial process to suggest that Equal Branch of our U.S. Government should be subject to “public opinion” OR MANIPULATED BY CONGRESS or THE WHITE HOUSE IN ANY WAY!!! Does Senator Warren think that the majority of voters are abject fools??? Maybe so…

    1. “Does Senator Warren think that the majority of voters are abject fools??? Maybe so…”

      Why would she think otherwise? The voters have not shown themselves to be anything but.

    2. Horseactivist,

      “ She is fundamentally AGAINST THE LAW…”

      What law would that be? The law (constitution) allows for the expanding of the Supreme Court. It doesn’t prohibit whether any of the new justices be from one ideology or another.

      Turley supports expanding the court, but he disingenuously argues that democrats want only extreme liberals judges. It’s a given that if republicans had the same opportunity they would do the exact opposite and seek to pack the court with more conservative justices. They have already been doing that with the lower courts.

      1. Svelaz: Do you associate “conservatism” on the Court with originalism or textualism? Just curious….

  16. Thank You Professor Turley…..for saying what needs saying in response to Professor Senator Fauxchohantas.

    She may remain a Senator if the voters in her State are stupid enough to vote for her….but when it comes to the rest of the Country….she is yesterday news.

    2022 shall be a not so gentle reminder to the Left that when the Marching Band is playing….one has to stay in step with the rest of the folks you are walking with or it turns into a shambles.

    2024 will be the icing on the Cake that is being baked by all of the failures of the radical Leftist Agenda that came in with Groping Joe and Wun Dum Ho.

    How Warren thinks she will be remotely considered as a serious candidate for anything….much less President goes to show how bad off the Democrat Party has become.

    Pelosi calling Biden “perfect”…..and Biden proclaiming a Democrat victory in 2022….and oh…..how about that BBB thing……you know the Thing?

  17. So who is the biggest fool, EW or those who elected her? How do we standby allowing boldface liar’s to represent us? They marry relatives to gain entry into our nation, claim they are American Indian for benefits and lie like dogs about impeachment evidence. Who are the fools?

  18. There’s something wrong with representation if it gives us representatives like the Squad. We should reconsider this.

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