Ongoing discussion of SCOTUS cases (2 Viewers)

[MT15]

With the increased scrutiny due to recent revelations in the press I thought maybe we can use a SCOTUS thread. We can discuss the impending Senate investigation and the legislation proposed today by Murkowski and King in the Senate that will formalize ethical guidelines.

We can also use this thread to highlight cases that possibly don’t deserve their own thread, like the following.

I saw this case today, and I cannot believe the US Government is allowed to do this. Unreasonable search and seizure? The examples he gives in the rest of the thread are just sickening:

 

[MT15]

They would definitely force Thomas and Alito into retirement. I would bet money on it. It would be easy to do, all they have to do is suddenly grow a spine about judicial corruption, and they’re out the door. If Trump wins they will do that in a flat minute.

 

[SaintForLife]

 

[bird]

Correct. The amendment as written states the right is within the context of a well organized militia.

 

[Bayouboy]

Just curious. Now that the immunity decision has been rendered, can future courts reverse the ruling? Just for arguments sake say a new court 10-20 years from now sees the err of this ruling, what happens or can happen? I'm really still in disbelief that this court put one man above the country.

 

[DaveXA]

Just curious. Now that the immunity decision has been rendered, can future courts reverse the ruling? Just for arguments sake say a new court 10-20 years from now sees the err of this ruling, what happens or can happen? I'm really still in disbelief that this court put one man above the country.

It certainly could be reversed. I mean, they've reversed themselves more than a handful of times in history, and they will again. Congress could also address it, but I believe that would require a super majority to amend the Constitution to address that. Ain't gonna happen anytime soon tho.

 

[Optimus Prime]

I’m pretty sure a future Supreme Court can't just arbitrarily reverse a previous SCOTUS decision there would have to be a specific case to review that would allow the reversal

 

[DaveXA]

I’m pretty sure a future Supreme Court can't just arbitrarily reverse a previous SCOTUS decision there would have to be a specific case to review that would allow the reversal

Indeed.

 

[bird]

I’m pretty sure a future Supreme Court can't just arbitrarily reverse a previous SCOTUS decision there would have to be a specific case to review that would allow the reversal

Of course, they took on the website case and cake baker case which both had false foundations. So…

 

[Optimus Prime]

Of course, they took on the website case and cake baker case which both had false foundations. So…

This court has set the precedent that the 'case' can be purely hypothetical

 

[bird]

This court has set the precedent that the 'case' can be purely hypothetical

Welp, time to overturn that stupidity. They need to be informed that the court has to be reality based.

 

[LA - L.A.]

It certainly could be reversed. I mean, they've reversed themselves more than a handful of times in history, and they will again. Congress could also address it, but I believe that would require a super majority to amend the Constitution to address that. Ain't gonna happen anytime soon tho.

These are the two methods to amend the Constitution. Both methods require the support of at least 34 states.

How Difficult Is It to Amend the Constitution?

Find out about the processes used to amend the Constitution and see how many times the Constitution has been amended.

www.thoughtco.com

 

[DaveXA]

These are the two methods to amend the Constitution. Both methods require the support of at least 34 states.

How Difficult Is It to Amend the Constitution?

Find out about the processes used to amend the Constitution and see how many times the Constitution has been amended.

www.thoughtco.com

Yep.

 

[Optimus Prime]

If you want to know where Clarence Thomaswants to lead the ultraconservative majority supreme court, look for the words “in an appropriate case” in his concurring opinions.

In June 2016 the US supreme court delivered a ruling on a relatively obscure aspect of patent law. It attracted little press attention, and even less notice was given to a short concurring opinion from Thomas.

Just two paragraphs long, Thomas’s opinion in Cuozzo Speed Techs v Lee set out his opposition to the Chevron doctrine, a legal precedent tangentially related to the case that had stood as settled law for decades.

Chevron was a critical prop for federal agencies as they worked to protect the American people from pollution, workplace injuries and other public harms.

Thomas didn’t like the way Chevron granted federal experts leeway to reasonably interpret ambiguous laws – he claimed that was a legal “fiction” – and so in his concurring opinion he invited any interested party to challenge the precedent. “In an appropriate case,” he said, “this court should reconsider that fiction of Chevron and its progeny.”


A few months later, a group calling itself the New Civil Liberties Alliance (NCLA) was created with the express purpose of litigating cases before the courts, its top priority being to attack federal regulations and the “administrative state”.

NCLA claimed to be non-partisan, but it was founded by former employees of – with $5m seed money from – Charles Koch, the billionaire tycoon who has been a catalyst of ultra-right causes for a generation.

In March 2020 NCLA filed a complaint in federal district court that answered Thomas’s call. Relentless Inc v Department of Commerce, twinned with a second case Loper Bright Enterprises v Raimondo, did just as the justice wanted – they challenged the Chevron doctrine as a supposed legal fiction.

As Thomas had intended, the twin cases then wound their way up the judicial ladder to the supreme court, and onto his desk.

Two weeks ago Thomas joined the other five rightwing justices who now control the supreme court in striking down the Chevron doctrine.

Eight years almost to the day after he issued his concurring opinion, the cycle was now complete: his invitation to litigants had spawned a new organisation, backed by Koch, that custom-created a legal challenge designed to reach the supreme court, allowing Thomas and his hard right peers to gut a cornerstone of modern federal government that had been the law of the land for 40 years.…….

Since Thomas was appointed to the highest court in 1991, he has issued more than 250 concurring or dissenting opinions, many of which have proposed extreme rewritings of the law.

Josh Blackman, a constitutional law professor at the South Texas College of Law, identified 16 of those opinions where the justice brazenly invited litigation using the phrase “in an appropriate case” – the exact same wording as he used to instigate the destruction of the Chevron doctrine.


In 2022, when the supermajority overturned the right to an abortion by eviscerating Roe v Wade, Thomas went further. In a concurring opinion, he proposed reconsidering access to contraception as well as same-sex relationships and marriage.

He has repeatedly suggested that the first amendment right to free speech should be restricted, saying that it should not apply to school children or to categories of prisoner.

He went so far as to question New York Times v Sullivan, the 1964 supreme court precedent protecting news outlets from libel suits brought by public officials, that for 60 years has upheld press freedoms…….

How Clarence Thomas has provided a list of legal targets to ultra-right groups

The US supreme court justice has set out course of action by signaling ‘in an appropriate case’ in concurring opinions

www.theguardian.com

 

[MT15]

Thomas is probably the most corrupt individual we have seen on the Court.

 

[LA - L.A.]

Thomas is probably the most corrupt individual we have seen on the Court.

It's a pretty sad state of affairs that Thomas isn't definitively the most corrupt justice on the court, because of a few other justices currently on the court.

 

[bird]

It's a pretty sad state of affairs that Thomas isn't definitively the most corrupt justice on the court, because of a few other justices currently on the court.

Yeah, like we actually have to have a discussion about which one is most corrupt.

That is flocking disgusting.

 

[Sendai]

Of interest at the end of the court year , they passed on an Illinois assault weapons ban and in May they passed on a Maryland assault weapons ban.

 

[DaveXA]

Of interest at the end of the court year , they passed on an Illinois assault weapons ban and in May they passed on a Maryland assault weapons ban.

And...the point is?