I live in North Carolina, where the Republicans have run rough shod over the whole state (thank you gerrymandering), and the originating state where this case came from. I am pleased as punch that the GOP leader of the NC House of Representatives, Tim Moore, will forever have his name associated with this devastating setback for the Republicans and all election deniers. It will forever be called "the Moore case" and his name represents the losing side. Huge sigh of relief it went the way it did - this decision will protect our elections.
My brother and his family live in Chapel Hill and he is working hard to tip the state into the blue column! We have not given up hope. One day, there will be more people like him and you in the state!
Thank for the comment Jay. I live out west in a small town near Asheville. Gerrymandering split up Asheville (a liberal outpost) into 3 sections, attached them to conservative counties, and basically silenced the whole city. Here in the Blue Ridge mountains, it's very red territory. But we are fighting too. Thanks for the encouragement.
OH, man, I was being afraid that someone was going to realize what my district was. Cawthorn was an unmitigated disaster. But he was too stupid to do much harm to anything else except his own slimy reputation. The current guy, Chuck Edwards, is as bad, but with enough experience to do damage.
Confession is good for the soul. Does anyone remember who came before Cawthorn? Mark Meadows. He was our rep for 3-4 terms, before Cawthorn. The Republicans of the NC 11th District have a lot to answer for.
I also live in NC. In Tricia Cotham's district no less. I voted for her and am outraged at what she has done. I call or contact her every single day to demand her resignation. I don't expect her to but that won't stop me. My only hope is that her actions force some kind of change in recall laws or other consequences for someone else who does this. Now that Republicans have learned they can slip a trojan horse candidate in they WILL do it again. And that's what I believe she was. I don't believe she ever intended to stay a Dem for this term. Gerrymandering just makes it harder to get anything like that passed because we will forever be saddled with Republicans who prevent it.
Yeesh, what sea we find ourselves swimming in that we are relieved not to be eaten by the mutated Loch Ness Monster that was never there save for the extremist Pet Sematary concoction.
It is difficult of late to even craft a narrative, as we find ourselves mired in discussions about subjects that lack credibility and should be given not a pence, much less a quarter.
Can someone just please de-absurd everyone with their mind?
"Then in a brazen disregard for established precedent, the new court agreed to rehear the case about the partisan gerrymander, even though there were no new facts."
How does this reconcile with the constant "conservative" rant against activist judges, let alone upholding precedents? Is this not another example of applying rules to others that they ignore themselves?
Just to be clear, I was raised to regard the Supreme Court of the United States with the upmost respect. now however I must admit that Jay’s characterization of the 3 SSCOTUS (3 Stooges of the...) has me laughing out loud. They get no R-E-S-P-E-C-T from me anymore.
I love both the facts and the colorful commentary in this piece. I think the media should forever use “possibly soon-to-be-disbarred-lawyer John Eastman” in their reporting. But, seriously, I have never been more relieved by a Supreme Court ruling. Possibly not related, but I hope this brings something to the prosecution of fake electors in my state of Georgia. The good people elected one of them (Burt Jones) as the lieutenant governor last year. Still burns my a** that he is the #2 elected official in the state after coordinating a plan to change our electoral votes to the orange one (and disenfranchise all Democratic voters like me).
The media should also refer to tfg as “disgraced twice-impeached ex-president @&/#^%” (I make a practice of not writing the name that simply won’t go away.)
"GOP will have to try and win the election in 2024 fairly and squarely" - can you IMAGINE?! The SHOCK! What are they going to do - they don't know how?!
Seriously, though, I am wondering whether Roberts and Kavanaugh are attempting to behave because of all the scandals. Not because they wouldn't rather vote with the other three, but for fear of the backlash. Especially Kavanaugh. Since last year, every time SCOTUS manages to do something right, I can't help but wonder if they are trying to distract from something TRULY hideous.
I'd be in total agreement except that Chief Justice Roberts has added his own contribution to the stinking pile of Supreme Court corruption. Remember, his wife, the headhunter, connecting/placing promising young lawyers with legal firms that appear regularly before the SC. Roberts didn't disclose her payments from these high profile law firms, nor did he disclose possible conflicts of interest--IIRC?
Roberts own disclosure lapses may have prevented him from getting too pushy about his subordinate Justices blatant disclosure problems.
I have problems with Roberts’s wife’s work, but at least it is one step removed from the actual justice himself, which isn’t at all the case with some of these guys.
Well, true enough...but it is still close enough to give off a faint whiff of rot. And aren't the Supremes (and every other judge appointed by the Fed) enjoined not to give even the "...appearance of impropriety."?
Mrs. Roberts work, even though it is set somewhat apart from the work of the Court...is still close enough so that Roberts didn't feel entirely confident--evidently--about reporting income from her placement fees.
Chief Justice Roberts, I should think, ought to be one who would be exceptionally careful not to let his robe get soiled in the marketplace--so to speak.
Although you can't predict anything out of this court (and OMG "the Thomases" opinion!)... I had wondered if 4 justices agreed to hear the case simply to rule on it so that it would be put down for good? Yes you can decline to hear a case and let the lower court ruling stand, or you could hear a case to say on the record, "Hell no that's crazy AF don't try this again, and yes I am looking at you, Wisconsin and Ohio!"
Again that might be giving this court too much credit.
Before last year I would have shared the relief of this decision by believing the law has now been settled on this issue. But last year's abortion decision gives me no reason for comfort that another panel of judges like those that joined Alito in trashing the notion of stare decisis couldn't decide that the Moore case was wrongly decided and resurrect the huge asteroid.
SCOTUS decisions getting overturned is really nothing new, and it's not automatically bad. Imagine if Dredd Scott had survived! Like almost everything, stare decisis (or the absence of it) isn't good or bad in itself; it's all about how it is used.
That said, I'm hoping that a future SCOTUS will disregard stare decisis for any decision where one of the corrupt judges (Thomas, Alito, Kavernaugh) were part of the majority.
Interesting take by Michael Podhorzer: "We don’t have a “conservative” majority on the Supreme Court; we have a Federalist Society majority of six justices who are all members of that group, and who were only nominated by Republican presidents after being vetted by that group. We should think of the Federalist Society majority not necessarily as agents of the Republican Party, but as agents of the sponsors and corporate interests who created and continue to fund the Federalist Society, the Republican Party, and the Super PACs that support Republican candidates.
The Federalist Society justices are not political partisans; they are interest group partisans."
My fear is that this was a feint - a good one, but a feint nonetheless - for asteroids coming possibly tomorrow on LGBTQ rights, affirmative action, and student loans...
Time to introduce a "not so fast" addendum to yesterday's ruling, this opinion by Richard Pildes, Professor, NYU School of Law, in today's NYT:
"Relief that the court did not endorse this extreme position, though, must be tempered by the fact — which many initial responses to the decision have not recognized — that the court simultaneously endorsed a version of the independent state legislature theory. The court held that the Constitution imposes some limits on the way state courts interpret their own state constitutions. These limits also apply to the way state courts interpret state election statutes — as well as the way state election administrators apply state election statutes in federal elections.
Yet the court offers no guidance, no standard at all, for lower courts to know when a state court has gone too far. The decision merely says that “state courts do not have free rein” and that they may not “transgress the ordinary bounds of judicial review such that they arrogate to themselves the power vested in state legislatures to regulate federal elections.”
Yes, I read this take, and while I agree with it, there was no cause under these facts to get into the standard, other than to say ISL is not the way to proceed.
The point is, what the Supremes did in 2000 during the Bush v Gore arguments, where SCOTUS inserted itself into Florida election recount oversight by the FL state Supreme Court and usurped the state's court authority, can now be employed by any lower court when hearing challenges to state election laws or state court interpretations of such laws on the grounds of "transgression of normal judicial review", which then requires Constitutional remedy by federal courts, all the way up to SCOTUS. Not home-free yet, folks, by any means.
This was very helpful in my winning am argument with my husband yesterday. He read the verdict news and declared gerrymandering in the state dead. I dissented and said it had not to do with the gerrymamdering. He asked why them did the Republicans bring the case because they lost it. I said they HAD lost it until our court reopened the case and ruled in their favor. Argument ensued. Now I have won and while I am very happy at this decision I am still very upset that the court didn't rule anything about the awful gerrymandering here in NC. I do hope the other cases in other states get favorable rulings that MAY one day possibly eventually change things here. Because it is truly abominable how they draw the maps here. And until things here change we have an up mountain fight on our hands.
Thank you for pointing this out Renani. We in N.C are still stuck with gerrymandered maps. And we are still stuck with the “conservative state Supreme Court” which became conservative because of those extreme gerrymandered maps! Some substack writers seem to think N.C. will be going back to the previous 7-7 maps. But I’m not seeing it written anywhere in N.C. that will happen. Please tell me it will. (I don’t think so) Or otger writers just gloss over what will happen with maps in N.C. So in 2024 which maps will we have?
This gerrymandered maps switcheroo has gone on practically a dozen times in N.C. since the tea party takeover in 2010 and the(ir) beat goes on. Someone (or a lot of someones) spends hours and hours every day parsing every word, letter and punctuation mark of the Constitution and settled law to pull out yet another trickster way of getting what they want—complete control and, yes, the end of democracy. It is overwhelming to those of us interested in actual democracy.
I wonder if Justice Roberts had a lucid moment. Feeling some heat from the public majority? Or maybe doesn’t want to go down in history as the judge who let democracy die?🤔
I live in North Carolina, where the Republicans have run rough shod over the whole state (thank you gerrymandering), and the originating state where this case came from. I am pleased as punch that the GOP leader of the NC House of Representatives, Tim Moore, will forever have his name associated with this devastating setback for the Republicans and all election deniers. It will forever be called "the Moore case" and his name represents the losing side. Huge sigh of relief it went the way it did - this decision will protect our elections.
My brother and his family live in Chapel Hill and he is working hard to tip the state into the blue column! We have not given up hope. One day, there will be more people like him and you in the state!
Thank for the comment Jay. I live out west in a small town near Asheville. Gerrymandering split up Asheville (a liberal outpost) into 3 sections, attached them to conservative counties, and basically silenced the whole city. Here in the Blue Ridge mountains, it's very red territory. But we are fighting too. Thanks for the encouragement.
I think that's how you got the execrable Madison Cawthorn as your rep
OH, man, I was being afraid that someone was going to realize what my district was. Cawthorn was an unmitigated disaster. But he was too stupid to do much harm to anything else except his own slimy reputation. The current guy, Chuck Edwards, is as bad, but with enough experience to do damage.
Confession is good for the soul. Does anyone remember who came before Cawthorn? Mark Meadows. He was our rep for 3-4 terms, before Cawthorn. The Republicans of the NC 11th District have a lot to answer for.
Only know this because I had an acquaintance (now deceased) who lived in Asheville
he was a complete embarrassment. Thank heavens, he sold his house here and moved to Florida.
I also live in NC. In Tricia Cotham's district no less. I voted for her and am outraged at what she has done. I call or contact her every single day to demand her resignation. I don't expect her to but that won't stop me. My only hope is that her actions force some kind of change in recall laws or other consequences for someone else who does this. Now that Republicans have learned they can slip a trojan horse candidate in they WILL do it again. And that's what I believe she was. I don't believe she ever intended to stay a Dem for this term. Gerrymandering just makes it harder to get anything like that passed because we will forever be saddled with Republicans who prevent it.
Good for you!!! I, and others out here in the west have called her office too. Outrage is exactly the right word.
Yeesh, what sea we find ourselves swimming in that we are relieved not to be eaten by the mutated Loch Ness Monster that was never there save for the extremist Pet Sematary concoction.
It is difficult of late to even craft a narrative, as we find ourselves mired in discussions about subjects that lack credibility and should be given not a pence, much less a quarter.
Can someone just please de-absurd everyone with their mind?
Trump can declassify with his mind, apparently, so maybe we can de-absurd with ours!
I'll give it a go right now
"Then in a brazen disregard for established precedent, the new court agreed to rehear the case about the partisan gerrymander, even though there were no new facts."
How does this reconcile with the constant "conservative" rant against activist judges, let alone upholding precedents? Is this not another example of applying rules to others that they ignore themselves?
The GOP has stopped really standing for anything principled and is now more about a raw thirst for political power.
You are right - it doesn't reconcile. They LOVE to cherrypick.
"Freedom for me, but not for thee." Or insert whatever, it is still their mantra. "Rules for thee, but not for me." - etc.
Just to be clear, I was raised to regard the Supreme Court of the United States with the upmost respect. now however I must admit that Jay’s characterization of the 3 SSCOTUS (3 Stooges of the...) has me laughing out loud. They get no R-E-S-P-E-C-T from me anymore.
Thanks as always, Jay.
I love both the facts and the colorful commentary in this piece. I think the media should forever use “possibly soon-to-be-disbarred-lawyer John Eastman” in their reporting. But, seriously, I have never been more relieved by a Supreme Court ruling. Possibly not related, but I hope this brings something to the prosecution of fake electors in my state of Georgia. The good people elected one of them (Burt Jones) as the lieutenant governor last year. Still burns my a** that he is the #2 elected official in the state after coordinating a plan to change our electoral votes to the orange one (and disenfranchise all Democratic voters like me).
The media should also refer to tfg as “disgraced twice-impeached ex-president @&/#^%” (I make a practice of not writing the name that simply won’t go away.)
"GOP will have to try and win the election in 2024 fairly and squarely" - can you IMAGINE?! The SHOCK! What are they going to do - they don't know how?!
Seriously, though, I am wondering whether Roberts and Kavanaugh are attempting to behave because of all the scandals. Not because they wouldn't rather vote with the other three, but for fear of the backlash. Especially Kavanaugh. Since last year, every time SCOTUS manages to do something right, I can't help but wonder if they are trying to distract from something TRULY hideous.
There is the certainty of added scrutiny over everything they do, at least, from here forward.
Bingo! I keep having the same thought! Any ruling that isn’t wildly heinous seems like their way of saying “Squirrel!!”
This actually made me snort-laugh into my coffee. In a dark, desperate sort of way, but laugh nonetheless.
I'd be in total agreement except that Chief Justice Roberts has added his own contribution to the stinking pile of Supreme Court corruption. Remember, his wife, the headhunter, connecting/placing promising young lawyers with legal firms that appear regularly before the SC. Roberts didn't disclose her payments from these high profile law firms, nor did he disclose possible conflicts of interest--IIRC?
Roberts own disclosure lapses may have prevented him from getting too pushy about his subordinate Justices blatant disclosure problems.
I have problems with Roberts’s wife’s work, but at least it is one step removed from the actual justice himself, which isn’t at all the case with some of these guys.
Well, true enough...but it is still close enough to give off a faint whiff of rot. And aren't the Supremes (and every other judge appointed by the Fed) enjoined not to give even the "...appearance of impropriety."?
Mrs. Roberts work, even though it is set somewhat apart from the work of the Court...is still close enough so that Roberts didn't feel entirely confident--evidently--about reporting income from her placement fees.
Chief Justice Roberts, I should think, ought to be one who would be exceptionally careful not to let his robe get soiled in the marketplace--so to speak.
Whew is right!😳 Yikes. I’m glad I was unaware of this until now. Thank you for keeping us informed.
Although you can't predict anything out of this court (and OMG "the Thomases" opinion!)... I had wondered if 4 justices agreed to hear the case simply to rule on it so that it would be put down for good? Yes you can decline to hear a case and let the lower court ruling stand, or you could hear a case to say on the record, "Hell no that's crazy AF don't try this again, and yes I am looking at you, Wisconsin and Ohio!"
Again that might be giving this court too much credit.
I think it would be a huge risk for the liberals to allow this to be passed upon by cert. That is my take.
That's very true. I'm in complete agreement with your headline.
Before last year I would have shared the relief of this decision by believing the law has now been settled on this issue. But last year's abortion decision gives me no reason for comfort that another panel of judges like those that joined Alito in trashing the notion of stare decisis couldn't decide that the Moore case was wrongly decided and resurrect the huge asteroid.
SCOTUS decisions getting overturned is really nothing new, and it's not automatically bad. Imagine if Dredd Scott had survived! Like almost everything, stare decisis (or the absence of it) isn't good or bad in itself; it's all about how it is used.
That said, I'm hoping that a future SCOTUS will disregard stare decisis for any decision where one of the corrupt judges (Thomas, Alito, Kavernaugh) were part of the majority.
Interesting take by Michael Podhorzer: "We don’t have a “conservative” majority on the Supreme Court; we have a Federalist Society majority of six justices who are all members of that group, and who were only nominated by Republican presidents after being vetted by that group. We should think of the Federalist Society majority not necessarily as agents of the Republican Party, but as agents of the sponsors and corporate interests who created and continue to fund the Federalist Society, the Republican Party, and the Super PACs that support Republican candidates.
The Federalist Society justices are not political partisans; they are interest group partisans."
But they do NOT necessarily support MAGA chaos.
https://michaelpodhorzer.substack.com/p/dont-be-surprised-by-moore-v-harper
My fear is that this was a feint - a good one, but a feint nonetheless - for asteroids coming possibly tomorrow on LGBTQ rights, affirmative action, and student loans...
Affirmative action decision just dropped, and as predicted the right-wing majority just killed it re: college admissions.
Time to introduce a "not so fast" addendum to yesterday's ruling, this opinion by Richard Pildes, Professor, NYU School of Law, in today's NYT:
"Relief that the court did not endorse this extreme position, though, must be tempered by the fact — which many initial responses to the decision have not recognized — that the court simultaneously endorsed a version of the independent state legislature theory. The court held that the Constitution imposes some limits on the way state courts interpret their own state constitutions. These limits also apply to the way state courts interpret state election statutes — as well as the way state election administrators apply state election statutes in federal elections.
Yet the court offers no guidance, no standard at all, for lower courts to know when a state court has gone too far. The decision merely says that “state courts do not have free rein” and that they may not “transgress the ordinary bounds of judicial review such that they arrogate to themselves the power vested in state legislatures to regulate federal elections.”
Yes, I read this take, and while I agree with it, there was no cause under these facts to get into the standard, other than to say ISL is not the way to proceed.
Oops, hadn't finished the post...here is NYT link:
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/28/opinion/supreme-court-independent-state-legislature-theory.html
Also, the election laws expert Rick Kasen also published a cautionary note in Slate on the same grounds as Prof. Pildes:
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2023/06/supreme-court-voting-moore-v-harper-time-bomb.html
The point is, what the Supremes did in 2000 during the Bush v Gore arguments, where SCOTUS inserted itself into Florida election recount oversight by the FL state Supreme Court and usurped the state's court authority, can now be employed by any lower court when hearing challenges to state election laws or state court interpretations of such laws on the grounds of "transgression of normal judicial review", which then requires Constitutional remedy by federal courts, all the way up to SCOTUS. Not home-free yet, folks, by any means.
This was very helpful in my winning am argument with my husband yesterday. He read the verdict news and declared gerrymandering in the state dead. I dissented and said it had not to do with the gerrymamdering. He asked why them did the Republicans bring the case because they lost it. I said they HAD lost it until our court reopened the case and ruled in their favor. Argument ensued. Now I have won and while I am very happy at this decision I am still very upset that the court didn't rule anything about the awful gerrymandering here in NC. I do hope the other cases in other states get favorable rulings that MAY one day possibly eventually change things here. Because it is truly abominable how they draw the maps here. And until things here change we have an up mountain fight on our hands.
Thank you for pointing this out Renani. We in N.C are still stuck with gerrymandered maps. And we are still stuck with the “conservative state Supreme Court” which became conservative because of those extreme gerrymandered maps! Some substack writers seem to think N.C. will be going back to the previous 7-7 maps. But I’m not seeing it written anywhere in N.C. that will happen. Please tell me it will. (I don’t think so) Or otger writers just gloss over what will happen with maps in N.C. So in 2024 which maps will we have?
This gerrymandered maps switcheroo has gone on practically a dozen times in N.C. since the tea party takeover in 2010 and the(ir) beat goes on. Someone (or a lot of someones) spends hours and hours every day parsing every word, letter and punctuation mark of the Constitution and settled law to pull out yet another trickster way of getting what they want—complete control and, yes, the end of democracy. It is overwhelming to those of us interested in actual democracy.
Thanks for boiling this complex situation down to something that is understandable.
I wonder if Justice Roberts had a lucid moment. Feeling some heat from the public majority? Or maybe doesn’t want to go down in history as the judge who let democracy die?🤔