U.S. Supreme Court and the Constitution: the Disconnect
Or to paraphrase Tina Turner, “What’s the Constitution got to do with it?”
A Bloomberg survey asked twenty-one professors of constitutional law for their legal opinions regarding President Obama’s Affordable Care Act. Nineteen of these professors said they believe the Affordable Care Act — aka “Obamacare” — IS constitutional.
However, out of those nineteen constitutional law professors, only eight of them think the U.S. Supreme Court will uphold the Affordable Care Act. In other words eleven constitutional law professors think the law is constitutional but the Supreme Court will overturn it anyway.
But [scratches head] uhh…isn’t that the PURPOSE of the U.S. Supreme Court??? To decide whether or not a law violates the Constitution? Or do they make their rulings according to their mood swings, or whether they remembered to take their meds or who offered the largest bribes?
The Supreme Court already has the lowest public approval ratings ever. (Still higher than Congress’ poll ratings, but not by much.) Maybe the above-mentioned Disconnect has something to do with this.
Labels: constitutional law professors Affordable Care Act, Supreme Court overturn Affordable Care Act
posted by Tom Harper @ 12:58 PM
14 Comments:
Seems like republicans ruin everything they get their hands on. The Supreme Court is only one thing in a long list of things.
Jerry is correct, as usual!
I expect them to overturn most or all of the Affordable Health Care act by 5-4. They are about politics as much as (if not more than) law, and that's their current political makeup.
I'd like to see these people on the Supreme Court not in there for life, but given a set number of years to serve, although a problem with that might be that a president serving two terms might get to appoint a whole slug of justices to replace some whose time was running out.
There is an 11-year gap between the appointments of Breyer and Roberts. The justices appointed with their years of appointment are Scalia in 86, Kennedy in 88, Thomas 91, Ginsburg 93, Breyer 94, and then Roberts 05, Alito (aka Scalito) 06, Sotomayor 09 and Kagan 10.
For whoever is elected president this November, during the last year of his term Scalia and Kennedy will be 79, Thomas 67, Ginsburg 82, Breyer 77, Roberts 60, Alito 65, Sotomayor 61 and Kagan 55.
It's all fascinating, and it's food for thought.
Don't know exactly what it means, but 7 of the 9 justices have their law degrees from Harvard... and our president. Doesn't it seem that Harvard has gotten a little too big for its britches?
Maybe we need a minimum, maximum, or both age limit on justices, rather than term limits. We want experience, but not confusion.
Conservative Courts have been working on it for over 120 years
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santa_Clara_County_v._Southern_Pacific_Railroad
Erik
There's a pack of political hacks and liars on the court right now. That's no surprise, considering the presidents who appointed them.
Interestingly,Rachel Maddow mentioned this evening that there is precedent for the federal government mandating that people buy something. A 1792 (I think she said) law required people to have rifles and ammunition in their homes, in case they would be called on to help defend the country.
Not that things like precedent and supposedly settled, established law seems to mean a tinker's damn to the likes of Scalia, Roberts, Alito and Thomas.
Interestingly,Rachel Maddow mentioned this evening that there is precedent for the federal government mandating that people buy something. A 1792 (I think she said) law required people to have rifles and ammunition in their homes, in case they would be called on to help defend the country.
Try buying a house on a floodplain. The Federales can absolutely make you buy flood insurance.
Jolly Roger beat me to it. That very thing happened to me in south Dade County (Miami) a few years back.
Of course the most obvious piece of "guvment" interference is mandatory automobile insurance. I'm not saying it is a bad thing, but government induced.
As to the Supreme Court...pack of thieves and whores. Well, at least five of them are.
Don't forget folks, each time a whackadoo is nominated, the dums more often than not gleefully vote in favor.
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The problem with auto insurance is that it is the state government mandating purchase not the federal government.
Guvmint is not always guvmint!
The federal government mandates auto insurance on military reservations. Go by most any good-sized base and you'll see a few cars parked in small lot outside the gates. Some of those cars belong to military people and civilian employees who don't have insurance and so can't get a base sticker.
I'm sure the federal government requires auto insurance in the District of Columbia, Area 51, TVA lands, the Hanford nuclear reservation, Los Alamos and all NASA facilities, as well.
What Jerry said, so I don't have to waste brain cells this morning because I am losing what is left of my mind with all the shenanigans from the pugs.
The dreadful "majority 5" are the worst this court has ever produced. Scalia is narrow-minded and crazy; Thomas is a silent, amoral buffoon; Alito is an ideologue through and through; Roberts is a smug and arrogant little jerk who makes his mind up first and then refers to the facts only when necessary; and Kennedy is a spineless wimp who goes whichever direction the wind is blowing. This is the Extreme Court, and it richly deserves our contempt.
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