This almost surely will involve its own thread, when the time comes…
If we are to have a thoroughly Republican government, let it come through a fair contest at the nation’s ballot boxes.
thehill.com
If the Supreme Court agrees with the GOP-controlled legislature, it will be a godsend to the Republican Party in two critical respects. First, it will allow gerrymandered GOP legislatures to self-perpetuate and to approve voting rules that disfavor all other parties. Governors, who are necessarily
more politically moderate than gerrymandered legislatures because they must appeal to statewide constituencies, and state supreme court justices, who are either appointed by those governors or face their own statewide elections, would have no ability to counter those actions.
Secondly, Article ll, Section 1, of the Constitution uses similar wording for the appointment of electors to the electoral college, i.e., “Each State shall appoint [Electors], in such manner as the Legislature thereof may direct.” A Court holding in favor of the legislature would provide legitimacy to the type of efforts made by GOP extremists in the 2020 election to present alternate slates of presidential electors. What a gift to Justice Clarence Thomas’s wife,
Ginni, who labored so hard to get legislators in at least two states, Arizona and Wisconsin, to submit alternate elector slates to the electoral college favoring President Trump. Justice Thomas has a glaring conflict of interest in this case and must recuse himself, even at the risk of marital discord in his home.
Although a ruling for the legislature would be a major coup for the GOP, it would be a hammer blow to the rule of law in America. The idea that a state legislature, acting on its own, could set important substantive rules for the conduct of federal elections, is a rude affront to the very fabric of our constitutional system of checks and balances.
Those who wrote the Constitution were driven by the idea that governmental power should be divided among the three branches of government – executive, legislative and judicial – so that each branch could act as a check on the power of the others. The legislature passes legislation, which only becomes law with the approval of the executive, and the state courts have the power to rule upon it. It’s as simple as that. The framers of our Constitution would be dumbfounded to think that our high court could even be considering such a rogue scheme as the legislature is peddling.
