Tag: Supreme Court

Voting challenges

Vote for Democracy #57


(Photo by Lucas Sankey on Unsplash)

The United States is facing even more serious challenges to our election system.

The US Supreme Court’s 6-3 decision in Callais has set off a spate of redistricting in southern states which, while they are being labeled as partisan, are effectively race-based, even though primary elections are very close, or, as in Louisiana, already underway. All of these states are looking to cut down the number of Democrats and Black elected officials.

This morning, the Virginia Supreme Court struck down the April vote that would have redistricted that state and potentially added more Democrats to the US House of Representatives in the midterm elections in November.

It’s very discouraging because Trump and the Republicans are actively trying to stay in power through manipulating the electoral system, even though their policies are increasingly harmful and unpopular.

It’s time for citizens to take back their electoral power. Given that new district lines will make it more difficult for Democrats and people of color to elect their preferred candidates, voter turnout will be crucial. It may, though, not be sufficient to overcome these new obstacles. Voters who are registered as Republicans need to vote against all Republican nominees who favor these unfair and unconstitutional policies and help elect officials who believe in the principle of one person, one vote and who will uphold our civil liberties and rights.

I admit that this is a discouraging time in our efforts to uphold democracy but we must keep working on it. As Joyce Vance titled her recent book, Giving Up Is Unforgivable.

Vote for Democracy #22

how being a Catholic woman serves as preparation for the incoming administration

(Photo by Lucas Sankey on Unsplash)

I’ve written before about the intersection of how the conservatives in the Catholic Church treat women and issues such as abortion. I’ve also posted more specifically how Leonard Leo and Opus Dei have impacted the Supreme Court and broader governance issues.

While many in the contemporary Catholic church have come to embrace the radical inclusiveness of Jesus, especially for those who are oppressed, others cling to the misogyny, racism, and bigotry that held for centuries when the Church engaged in empire and building of worldly rather than spiritual power. Even into modern times, this has resulted in women not being treated as equals in the Church and in society, along with discrimination against people due to their race, religion, sexual identity, place of origin, and economic status.

While I am blessed to know many in the Catholic church who do recognize my dignity and gifts, there are a number of powerful bishops and laity who do not. These, including an out-sized number of Supreme Court justices, governors such as Texas’s Abbott and Florida’s DeSantis, and the incoming vice-president, JD Vance, are loudly proclaiming and taking action that restrict the rights and freedoms of women and girls. Besides restrictions on abortion that have resulted in permanent injury or death to women, there are also moves to restrict contraception and recognize any fertilized egg as a person, all the while denying personhood rights to any pregnant person.

We are even hearing calls for women, especially mothers, to give up paid employment in order to be at home full-time. Shockingly, some are even calling for the repeal of the 19h Amendment of 1920 which recognized women’s right to vote everywhere in the United States.

While I am sadly accustomed to being recognized as less than a full and equal person in the Catholic church, it is frightening to see these same calls in the context of the United States’ government.

I commit to continuing to fight for equal rights for women and girls, as well as for those of all faith traditions or none, those of all races, ethnicities, and places of origin, all genders and sexual orientations, and all ages and health circumstances, to be treated with equal dignity and protection in the United States. This is also in keeping with Catholic social justice doctrine.

I know millions of others are already at work and will never back down on these human right issues. That we will have to fight for these rights that had been considered settled is disconcerting but I know we will prevail in the long run.

I mourn, though, for those who have been harmed and who will be harmed in the meantime.

One-Liner Wednesday: superseding indictment

After presenting evidence to a new grand jury, Special Counsel Jack Smith filed this superseding indictment against Donald Trump in the 2020 election interference case before Judge Tanya Chutkan, charging Trump as a candidate in conspiracy with other private citizens, thus avoiding any evidence that could be thought of as part of his “official duties” after the controversial Supreme Court decision bestowing broad presidential immunity for official acts and evidence related to executive branch communications, including the Department of Justice.

This post brought to you as part of Linda’s One-Liner Wednesdays. Find out more here: https://lindaghill.com/2024/08/28/one-liner-wednesday-take-a-guess/

Vote for Democracy ’24 #9

On the second anniversary of the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade

(Photo by Lucas Sankey on Unsplash)

I’ve written several posts dealing with abortion – after the leak of the Dobbs decision, about the aftermath of the first month after it was handed down, and about a year later in a post about the out-sized influence of the Catholic Church with conservative members of the Supreme Court and some governors.

Today is the second anniversary of the Dobbs decision, which overturned the national right to abortion recognized by the decision in Roe v. Wade in 1973.

Some of the worst fears of the public have already occurred. With many states imposing total or near-total bans, people with a problem pregnancy have been forced to flee to distant states to receive care. This has even happened when the mother’s life, health, and/or future fertility are under threat or when the fetus has a problem that is so severe it is “incompatible with life.” Women have even been refused treatment when they are clearly in the process of suffering a miscarriage, the commonly used term to describe a spontaneous abortion. Unfortunately, some of these women will go on to develop sepsis or life-threatening hemorrhage which could have been avoided by performing a timely D&C.

Remember also that abortion is safer than pregnancy and childbirth. This is especially true for girls and for women of color, who face higher risks of life-altering complications and death. Mifepristone, one of the most-used drugs for medication abortions, has a lower rate of complications than acetaminophen (Tylenol).

It has become clear that some state and national level elected officials want to make all or nearly all abortions illegal in the United States. Additionally, there are threats against the legality of contraceptives. Fertility clinics that offer IVF face uncertainty in states that want to recognize that life begins at conception, bestowing personhood rights on fertilized eggs.

I find this argument particularly unconvincing, given that, in the course of a woman’s life, a substantial number of fertilized eggs don’t even implant and cause a pregnancy. Conception seems to be much too early a marker of life. A common rejoinder if one is unconvinced of personhood beginning at conception is to ask when does life begin. I think that life begins when one can breathe, which is already part of our legal definition. If a baby is born but never takes a breath, it is recorded as a stillbirth, not a birth and a death. People die after they take their last breath. Interestingly, the legal framework for abortion under Roe v. Wade relied on viability; given that the lungs are the last major organ to develop fully, the ability to breathe is inherent in the definition of viability.

The person who is definitely breathing and alive and a person through all this is the person who is pregnant. Their life and their rights should be clearly recognized and respected. No government official should be able to dictate their medical care. Period.

In the upcoming state and federal elections, when looking at candidates’ positions on issues, evaluate their stance on abortion and contraception. Do they allow each person to make medical choices regarding these issues, relying on their own judgement after consulting medical practitioners, family members, faith leaders, etc., or do they favor laws that substitute their preferences and beliefs over yours?

On the presidential side, it is clear that the Biden/Harris ticket advocates for the right of the individual to make personal medical decisions unencumbered by government. Meanwhile, Donald Trump has been bragging about his Supreme Court appointees overturning Roe. Project 2025, a blueprint for a second Trump administration, reveals ways it would impose abortion restrictions throughout the US.

Also consider how candidates regard women’s rights. For some candidates, attacking abortion and reproductive rights goes along with the idea that women should go back to “traditional” roles where they didn’t work outside the home. A few have even suggested that women should not be allowed to vote!

So, vote like your rights – and the rights of your family, friends, and neighbors – depend on it.

That may very well be literally true.

Vote for Democracy #6

(Photo by Lucas Sankey on Unsplash)

I can’t quite believe that I am compelled to write this but I feel I must after yesterday’s Supreme Court hearing on whether or not blanket presidential immunity exists.

Donald Trump’s lawyer was arguing that a president shouldn’t be able to be prosecuted by the judicial system for criminal acts, including ordering the assassination of a political rival, if it was considered an official presidential act.

He is saying that, literally, a United States president should be able to get away with murder.

That is wrong legally, ethically, and morally.

Every person, citizen or not, elected official or not, is subject to the laws of the United States and whatever state or other jurisdiction they find themselves.

Period.

Do not vote for Donald Trump or any other candidate who believes that any person should be above the law.

Catholicism and governance in the US

When I wrote this post on the immediate aftermath of the Dobbs decision in the US Supreme Court throwing all abortion rule-making back to the states, I alluded to the way the opinion followed Catholic teaching and my fears for what that would mean.

Of the nine justices on the current Supreme Court, seven were raised Catholic. (Justice Gorsuch was raised Catholic but is now an Episcopalian.) Of the seven, only Justice Sotomayor was nominated by a Democratic president; her views seem to be more mainstream among Catholics in the US.

The five Republican-appointed practicing Catholics (Justices Roberts, Thomas, Alito, Cavanaugh, and Barrett) and Justice Gorsuch are/were all either members of or closely affiliated with members of Opus Dei, a secretive, ultra-conservative group that rose to prominence in the fascist period in Spain. Leonard Leo, a board member of Opus Dei and, for many years, a powerful leader of the Federalist Society, was a supporter/promoter of all six Republican-nominated justices and is also known to have fostered relationships between conservative billionaires and various justices. Beyond the Dobbs ruling, there have been a number of Supreme Court decisions that seem to reflect the Opus Dei viewpoint more than Supreme Court precedent and mainstream Constitutional interpretation.

Sadly, many of the fears I had about the out-sized influence of conservative Catholic opinions about abortion have come to pass, in some states, aided and abetted by conservative, Catholic-raised governors, such as Greg Abbott of Texas and Ron DeSantis of Florida. In states where abortion is illegal or restricted to early weeks, women have hemorrhaged, developed sepsis, lost their ability to carry a child, or even died from lack of timely abortion care. There is currently a lawsuit in Texas by women who were denied abortion care in cases of pregnancy complication or fatal fetal conditions; these stories illustrate what happens when you force the conservative Catholic viewpoint that privileges the life of the unborn over the life of the mother on the public and medical providers. Indeed, in many of the states with restrictive abortion bans, medical providers trained in women’s/maternal health are leaving the state and medical schools and hospitals are having difficulty attracting students and providers to their programs because they can’t offer the full range of services to their patients. This is worsening already critical shortages of providers, especially in rural areas. When statistics become available, we may see a worsening of maternal morbidity/mortality and infant mortality rates, which are already much higher in the US than in most other countries with advanced medical systems.

The states with the most restrictive abortion laws are seeing some other impacts. Young people are sometimes refusing to consider going to school or taking jobs in states that restrict abortion, not only for fear of not being able to get care they need but also in recognition of inequality on the basis of sex. Lack of choice about where service members will be stationed is adding to recruiting problems for the armed services. Currently, Sen. Tuberville of Alabama is holding up all high-level military appointments in the Senate because the military policy is to pay for service members to travel out of state for reproductive care that is not provided in the state where service members and their families are stationed. (Note: Federal money is not used to fund elective abortion. This controversy is about funding travel/leave only.) I don’t think that it occurred to me that the Dobbs decision would impact our military readiness as a nation, but here we are.

We are also seeing proof that the overruling of Roe is not the end of the story. In some states, the legality of birth control is being challenged in the legislature. Many Republicans on the national level are proposing a national ban on abortion, even though the Dobbs decision said that the issue should be decided state by state. Voters in the midterm elections are weighing in on the side of abortion rights as articulated in Roe; it seems they may continue to do so in future elections.

I’m also afraid that this ultra-conservative Catholic viewpoint on the Supreme Court is feeding the larger problem of Christian nationalism. The United States is not a Christian nation; it is a pluralistic nation. The First Amendment of our Constitution tells us that our country shall not have an established religion.

The Federalist Society members are supposed to be originalists. You would think they would know that.

As an American, it is my right to make personal decisions based on my beliefs. The government does not have the right to impose a religious belief on me. It seems to me that this Opus Dei-influenced Supreme Court has crossed that line more than once. Whether a future Court overrules these decisions or Congress passes laws clarifying their intent remains to be seen.

Supreme Court reform?

Back in October 2020, I posted some ideas about possible changes to procedures for the Supreme Court and other federal courts.

There has been much more public debate about this these past few years, particularly since the Supreme Court majority has been tossing precedents and inventing new doctrine on a regular basis of late.

One idea that makes sense to me is to raise the number of Supreme Court justices to thirteen to match the number of federal appellate courts. When the number of justices was changed to nine, there were nine appellate courts, so it makes sense to update the number to match because a Supreme Court justice is assigned for each appellate court. As it is now, some justices are responsible for more than one circuit. Doing this now would also help to redress some of the shenanigans that Mitch McConnell pulled in not allowing consideration of President Obama’s nominee while rushing through one of President Trump’s.

As I wrote in my October 2020 post, I think there should be rules for voting on judicial nominees in a timely manner, committee votes within sixty days and floor votes within ninety. The exception would be a Supreme Court vacancy that occurs after July first in a presidential election year which would be kept open for appointment by the winner of the election.

Because lifetime appointments are not stipulated in the Constitution, there has been a lot of discussion of making the term of Supreme Court justices eighteen years, after which they would serve on an appellate court if they were not ready to retire. I don’t know what that would mean for people who have already served longer than that or that were appointed expecting to serve for a lifetime. There is nothing in the Constitution that says Supreme Court nominations are for life, so no amendment is necessary to effect this change.

There have been a number of issues that have come to the fore more recently. One of them is the urgent need for ethics reform for the Supreme Court. Unlike other levels of the courts, there is no written code of conduct with guidance for recusals, conflicts of interest, etc. In other courts, judges are supposed to avoid even the appearance of conflict of interest. Given that both Justices Thomas and Alito are known to have accepted lavish gifts from prominent, rich Republicans, it would be helpful to have explicit rules to follow. It also upsets me that two members of the Court have been credibly accused of sexual harassment. There are serious questions about the spouses of two members of the Court earning money from work for/with people who might be seeking to influence the Court. I think there should be ethics reform and ways to enforce violations. As it is now, the Supreme Court justices are accountable to no one, which leaves them outside the usual system of checks and balances. (While it is true that provisions for impeachment and trial through Congress are in place, political forces are so prominent there that votes tend to be on partisan concerns rather than the evidence presented, so the threat of that doesn’t function as a deterrent to judicial misconduct.)

The Republican-appointed justices of the majority have undertaken what seems to be a concerted effort to overturn long-standing precedents. The most obvious is the Heller decision overturning national abortion rights but there are other instances, such as the recent decision against using race as a factor in college admissions which had been upheld numerous times since the 1978 Bakke decision, most recently in 2016. It’s not that precedents should never be overturned, for example, the Dred Scott decision, but those decisions usually advanced people’s rights; this Court seems to be taking away rights that had been previously recognized by the Court and the public. During their confirmation hearings in the Senate, these justices had all proclaimed their intent to respect precedent and “settled law” but they seem to have abandoned this principle.

The Republican-appointed majority are also inventing or embracing new legal constructs, such as the “major questions” doctrine, insisting that Congress must explicitly state the actions that they intend the executive branch department to implement. The Court used this to prevent rules regarding carbon pollution from the power industry. However, the justices overlooked explicit language from Congress giving authority to the Secretary of Education to waive student loans in time of national emergency in the recent case against the Biden administration’s targeted student loan forgiveness program. So, these justices appear to want Congress to be specific about things they don’t favor while ignoring the legislative language when they are specific. That’s not how our legal system is supposed to work.

There have also been major problems with the Court accepting cases without standing. In order to bring a case in federal court, a plaintiff has to show that they were harmed. The most obvious example of this is the 303 Creative case, in which a prospective web designer did not want to design sites for gay marriages but was afraid she would be violating a Colorado law barring discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation. She said that a man had approached her to create such a site, giving the man’s name and contact information as part of her case. There are a number of problems, though. She had not started the business and so hadn’t had any legal challenges that caused harm. When a reporter contacted the man that had been named as the prospective gay client, they found out that he had no idea he was named in the suit, had never contacted the web designer for wedding services, is not gay, has been married for fifteen years, and is a web designer himself who wouldn’t need her services. The case should have been thrown out of court but the Republican-appointed justices still ruled in her favor on free speech grounds, saying that she shouldn’t be forced to use her words to support gay marriage, which she opposes on religious grounds. [As a creative who uses words as her medium, I have trouble thinking of a web designer for wedding sites as using “her words” when it’s usually the clients’ words/content/story that goes into a wedding website. It seems more like being a reporter. Whether or not you agree with what is being said, it is your job to report it accurately.]

All of this has led to a lack of public confidence in Supreme Court. Many of their recent decisions are opposed by a majority of citizens. What bothers me more, though, is that the courts are supposed to uphold our rights and freedoms, whether those are popular or not. If a person has the right to make their own medical decisions in conjunction with their health care provider, it should not matter what state the person is in, what their gender is, whether or not they follow a religious practice, or what their skin color is. A parent has a right to object to a book being taught in their child’s school and request an alternate assignment; that parent does not have the right to make that decision for anyone else’s child.

In the United States, every citizen is supposed to enjoy “equal protection of the laws” under the Fourteenth Amendment. It’s an ideal we should be working toward continually but sometimes it seems we are in the Orwellian situation of some being “more equal than others.” We need to get back on track and court reform can help to do that.

One-Liner Wednesday: race in the US

But deeming race irrelevant in law does not make it so in life.

US Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson from the recent decision regarding affirmative action in college admissions on the basis of race

Join us for Linda’s One-Liner Wednesdays! Find out more here: https://lindaghill.com/2023/07/05/one-liner-wednesday-sometimes/

a helpful provision

When I wrote this post on environmental policy in the United States, I hadn’t realized an important section of an earlier House version on Environmental Protection Agency regulation of greenhouse gases had made it into the final version of the Inflation Reduction Act.

The language amends the Clean Air Act and is very specific that the EPA has the authority to regulate all greenhouse gases and to reduce them through the promotion of renewable energy.

This should blunt the impact of the Supreme Court decision in West Virginia v. EPA which held that the Congress had not been explicit enough in defining the scope of the EPA’s work in moving the country away from fossil fuels in order to limit global warming.

One more step in the right direction…

US environmental update

Trying to get the United States back to a better position regarding climate change and environmental issues in general has been a major task for the Biden administration. While some things were relatively straightforward, such as rejoining the Paris climate accords, others have been much more difficult.

Unwinding the changes that the prior administration had made to regulations was sometimes blocked by the courts. The biggest blow was the Supreme Court decision in West Virginia v. Environmental Protection Agency, in which a 6-3 majority found that the EPA can’t regulate emissions from coal-fired power plants unless they have been given specific direction by Congress. It was odd that the Supreme Court heard the case because it was brought against the Clean Power Plan, which was proposed by the Obama administration, but never enacted. The Biden administration had no intent to revive that plan, as circumstances have changed, so it appears that the conservative majority heard the case for the purpose of striking down the manner in which executive branch agencies and departments go about executing the laws that have been passed by Congress. This ruling could bog down not only EPA work but also the regulatory work of other Cabinet departments. [Please note that this is my layperson understanding of the case and its implications. There has been a lot of legal commentary which can be found in myriad places online, if you are interested.] An August 26 post with an update on the impact of this case can be found here.

Legislation to address the climate crisis was an important cornerstone of the Biden agenda. The House of Representatives passed a strong bill dealing with climate change and the care economy, including health care, universal education for three- and four-year-olds, provisions for child and elder care, permanent expansion of a fully refundable child tax credit, and other measures for social justice and equity. The bill was paid for by increasing taxes on wealthy individuals and corporations. Unfortunately, the 50-50 split in the Senate combined with Senate rules gave a couple of Democratic senators power over what was in the bill and they opposed some of the financial and energy provisions, so it looked as though it would not pass.

This was extremely discouraging to millions of people in the US, as well as to millions in the rest of the world who are depending on US action to cut carbon in the atmosphere and provide leadership for other countries to do the same.

And then, a surprise announcement that Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia, who made his money from coal and had shot down prior versions of the bill, had reached an agreement with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer on a version of the bill that he could support. Additional changes wound up being made to get Senator Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona on board. Senator Schumer kept the Senate in session in Washington into their August recess to pass the bill with Vice President Harris casting the tie-breaking vote. House Speaker Pelosi called the House back into session to pass the bill last Friday and President Biden will sign the bill into law this week.

While the Inflation Reduction Act is not as strong as the original legislation, I’m very happy that it will become law. It should bring down energy costs over time. It is projected to lower US greenhouse gas emissions by about 40% of 2005 levels by 2030; the United States goal in the Paris accord is a 50-52% reduction, so we hope that additional measures will be enacted to reach that goal. However, before this bill, we were on track for only a 25% reduction, so this is a major improvement. This article is a good summary of some of the main environmental/energy provisions of the bill.

I am grateful and still a bit shocked that this bill is about to become law. Yes, there is more to do, both on environmental and economic justice issues, but, at least, we have made a good start. This is important because people and the planet need this help and because it shows that the Democrats are actually serious about governing in a bipartisan way when it is possible, such as with the infrastructure law, and alone, if necessary. I hope that the progress in the last 18 months will encourage voters to keep the Democrats in the majority so more can get done in the next session. Perhaps, it will even give more Republican Congresspersons the impetus to support popular, commonsense measures that benefit the public. We have all witnessed past Republican majorities who were unable to pass much substantive legislation; for example, the Trump administration announced multiple “Infrastructure Weeks” but never got close to passing legislation. We have also, sadly, seen Republican minorities block action on legislation and appointments through the filibuster and other holds and delaying tactics. I think these need to be reformed so that the Congress is not bogged down and unable to do the work our country needs to function.

As the new programs ramp up, I encourage people in the US to be on the lookout for provisions that can help them make their lives greener, whether that is rebates on efficient electric appliances, incentives to buy used or new electric vehicles, or the opportunity to purchase renewable energy at lower than current rates. Support candidates who make the health and well-being of people and our environment their top priorities. We need representatives who are looking out for us, not just corporate profits and tax loopholes.

In my district, that means voting for the Democratic candidate. Make sure that you know the candidates’ positions in your area before casting your ballot.