Increasing the number of justices sitting on the Supreme Court is in the news again. Democrats are threatening to expand the High Court once they have the White House and a majority in the Senate. It’s for winning unconstitutional gains, not for getting it right.
Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland speaks of increasing the number of justices from nine to thirteen. Four new liberals would turn the current six to three conservative majority into a seven to six liberal takeover, coincidentally, of course. Raskin shouldn’t be taken seriously.
The attempt at logic behind the magic number thirteen is that it matches the federal appeals level. Thirteen for each sounds needed, but it’s not. Supreme Court Justices used to ride the circuit, they don’t anymore. Only one justice could ride one circuit and asking them to ride two would be logistically impossible. A lot has changed. The justices don’t ride any circuits, and no one thinks they should. Therefore, the number thirteen has no logical relevance to today’s Supreme Court.
The Wall Street Journal offers a brief history-
“The Seventh Circuit Act of 1807 created a new judicial circuit made up of Ohio, Kentucky and Tennessee and added a justice to ride it. The Eighth and Ninth Circuits Act of 1837 and the Tenth Circuit Act of 1863 expanded the high court further. But the Judicial Circuits Act of 1866 consolidated the circuits into nine, and the Judiciary Act of 1869 fixed the high court’s size at nine justices. By the time Congress created the modern 10th Circuit in 1929, it had abolished circuit riding.”
There really isn’t a need to expand. Losing Dobbs, Janis, and Heller have made liberals lose their mind. They cry illegitimacy, falsely claim that so-and-so is bought, and don’t even try to deconstruct the constitutional arguments that they keep losing. Court-packing is their solution and it should be rejected.
Republicans half-assed an attempt to lock-in the number at nine. Rep. Dusty Johnson of South Dakota proposed an Amendment to the Constitution that plainly read, “The Supreme Court of the United States shall be composed of nine justices.” While I certainly appreciate the narrow, condensed language, any proposed Amendment needs a two-thirds vote to get started and there is hardly anything today’s Congress could agree to at such a high rate. The vote was obviously to get incumbents in swing districts on the record as, and this is spin, wanting to change the court’s size. It’s been at nine for 150 years without having to enshrine it into the Constitution. Locking it in like that would require another amendment to change it, if We The People decide. We like liberty and less federal laws, and the two-thirds threshold was never going to be reached, so we would have voted nay, or opposed the idea that the Congress should be conducting show votes.
Anyone who wants to expand the Supreme Court needs to stop the partisan all-at-once solution. If Raskin were serious about the need to expand the court, then he would offer, or at least be interested in, staggering additions. Such as two now and two in four years, or two before the next presidential election and two after. Or one per term for the next four consecutive terms. But those plans can’t forecast who will have the White House to nominate and who will have the Senate for confirmation, so forget it.
And if the Supreme Court expands once during today’s heated political divide, then it would expand a dozen more times. 100 justices? Why stop there? Absurdity is hardly a limiting force lately. Such expansions would create a new legislative body, not a court.
For anyone who thinks there is a problem with the Supreme Court, then the solution is nominating and confirming better individuals to serve on the High Court. It starts with the presidential ballot box, so choose wisely. Then the process continues with your two US senators, so again, choose wisely and engage them whether your candidate won or lost. The media also needs to do better in reporting on the Supreme Court. The partisan bull is not supposed to be a factor, but sometimes it is and our national media can’t be counted on to report the difference. The burden falls on the people to sift through the dirt to find the gold in nearly every story.
We don’t think any expansion, contraction or permanent fixture is needed. The High Court operates well with nine. Adding more won’t stop. The Court’s opinion with 58 concurrences and 39 dissents would make for poor precedent and a poor understanding of law.