Progressives Going After Justice Breyer For Warning Against Packing U.S. Supreme Court
“It feels odd for me to have to remind a sitting justice that nowhere in the Constitution does it say there should be nine justices on the court.”
U.S. Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer has warned against the idea of packing the court and the left is not happy. Democrats and progressive activists learned a painful lesson with Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and they don’t want to go through that again. So now some of them are demanding that Breyer retire immediately, while Democrats control everything.
This all began after Breyer gave a lecture at Harvard Law School last week.
MSNBC host Mehdi Hasan is leading the charge against Breyer.
Yael Halon reports at FOX News:
MSNBC host calls on liberal Supreme Court Justice Breyer to retire after his warning against ‘court-packing’
MSNBC host Mehdi Hasan has called on liberal Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer to retire from the bench after he spoke out forcefully against court-packing earlier this week.
In the piece, published Thursday and starkly headlined “Justice Stephen Breyer Should Retire from the Supreme Court,” Hasan accused Breyer of intentionally overlooking the “partisanship” of his conservative colleagues, and dismissed his position as “naive, misguided and self-serving.”
“It feels odd for me to have to remind a sitting justice that nowhere in the Constitution does it say there should be nine justices on the court,” Hasan wrote at one point.
In a lecture at Harvard Law School on Tuesday, Breyer argued that politically-driven changes to the Supreme Court risked damaging the rule of law in the United States.
“Our power, the court’s power, has to depend on the public’s willingness to respect its decision,” Breyer said. “Respect even those decisions they disagree with… even when they think the decision is seriously mistaken.”
Here’s more from Hasan’s MSNBC column:
Justice Stephen Breyer should retire from the Supreme Court
Breyer is one of three liberal justices left on the court after President Donald Trump filled three vacancies in four years and gave the court a 6-3 hard-right majority. The aim of his address — named in honor of his late conservative colleague Justice Antonin Scalia — was to “make those whose initial instincts may favor important structural change or other similar institutional change, such as forms of ‘court-packing,’ think long and hard before they embody those changes in law.”…
It feels odd for me to have to remind a sitting justice that nowhere in the Constitution does it say there should be nine justices on the court. The court’s own website says, “The Constitution places the power to determine the number of Justices in the hands of Congress.” In fact, if Biden does eventually yield to pressure from liberal activists and Democratic lawmakers and decides to change the size of the court, backed by a congressional majority, he will be following in the footsteps of five previous presidents — history-makers like John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson, Abraham Lincoln, Ulysses S. Grant.
MSNBC covered this issue on the air as well:
Of course, the far left group ‘Demand Justice’ has jumped on this:
We need to start the process of confirming a Black woman justice now.
Sign the petition to tell Justice Breyer: Put the country first. Don’t risk your legacy to an uncertain political future. Retire now.https://t.co/b6IDk8pbgN pic.twitter.com/NjSSePvTMc
— Demand Justice (@WeDemandJustice) April 9, 2021
Hat tip to Professor Jonathan Turley:
In the 1960s, it was an "Impeach Earl Warren" campaigns. In 2021, it is a "Retire Stephen Breyer" campaign, including billboard trucks. Breyer is being cancelled because he spoke out against court packing–called naive by a MSNBC host… https://t.co/9IwA7p0CiI
— Jonathan Turley (@JonathanTurley) April 9, 2021
Featured image via YouTube.
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Comments
Like most devout Communists who faithfully sought to turn the US into one vast “antiracist” concentration camp, Justice Breyer never really thought the madness would one day come for him.
Respecfully, I must urge Mr. LaChance to refrain from using the word “Progressives” to refer to these Leftist totalitarians. AKA, Dhimmi-crats. “Progressive” is their contrived, self-congratulatory and narcissistic moniker which they employ to indicate their self-perceived (and, fallacious) sense of moral and intellectual superiority. These vile reprobates are “regressives.”
If “Progressive” is going to be employed, at least put the phrase in quotation marks.”
Or at least call them “Progressive neo-Marxists”.
If they pack the court what’s left of the Constitution will get the same treatment Comrade Pelosi gave Trump’s State Of The Union transcript.
Regressive communists.
Big NO NO, Thou shalt not speak against the narrative!
Do you actual know what a progress or for that matter what a communist is? You seem to use both terms as perjorative terms without the slightest clue as to what they represent. Nor any idea who might be which.
Since being a progressive in modern context is merely the idea that there is vast social and economic inequalities which is pretty robustly supported by evidence you might want to engage with the policy ideas rather than dismissing them on the basis of what seems to be total ignorance.
If you only had a brain, mark311. You can’t seriously believe this childish drivel: “being a progressive in modern context is merely the idea that there is vast social and economic inequalities.” No, being “progressive” means being a woke tyrant fascist intent on silencing anyone not on the woke plantation and using divisive identity politics to not only silence opposition (with whom they can’t compete fairly on the battleground of ideas, obviously, so resort to shutuppery, cancel culture, purging, and reeducation) but to impose its Utopian lunacy on an unwilling citizenry.
Progressives are the most regressive, backward-looking lunatics on the planet, and yes, they are very much enamored of communism because it allows them to force everyone, but their elite ruling class (have you never wondered why ALL socialist/communist countries have an extremely wealthy elite ruling class? Or is that just too hard to grapple with?), to be equally impoverished and beholdened to the state. That is–and has always been–“progressivism”: the same create the “perfect citizen in the perfect utopian world” lunatics who segregated the military, launched eugenics as a corrective measure against non-perfect citizens, established abortion as a means of genocide against black people, and banned alcohol to ensure that homes were harmonious and free from drunkenness and debauchery.
Because, after all, progressives have to control every single aspect of everyone and everything, otherwise their perfect human race can’t be manifested. They must have a means to eliminate the unsavory and wrongthinkers, right?
You really need to do some research on progressives, particularly in America, but on your side of the pond, too. You might find that they are an idealistic, psychotic bunch of nutters who really believe that if they can just purge the world of wrongthink (and, most alarming, of wrongthinkers), human beings can live in an egalitarian harmony with everyone contributing according to his/her/its ability and everyone having their basic needs met by the collective.
This doesn’t work on even a small scale (see every single failed ’60’s commune, heck see every single failed commune since then, too); humans aren’t perfect and can’t be perfected no matter how much progressives insist they can be and to what genocidal lengths progressives are willing to go.
TWO progressives can’t live in harmony in a single household if they actually abide by their crazy pie-in-the-sky crazy. Wait, you didn’t contribute all your pay to the collective pot! You didn’t take out the trash, fertilize the veg patch, do the laundry! You are not an equal here, I am doing ALL the work, and you just feed off my efforts, you lazy fascist pig! . . . . But yeah, let’s remake the world into some progressive fantastical idea of perfection. What a freaking joke.
“Going after.” That’s all leftists do: attack, attack, attack anyone who deviates from the party propaganda, then double-down against the pushback.
If that gets no results, violent street gangs are employed to change the political landscape.
The GOPe response is to capitulate, apologize, then resign.
A stellar recipe for a third world sh!th0le. ARE YOU AWAKE YET AMERICA?
The left isn’t a unified block. Some left wingers are dicks , some aren’t the same is true of the right .
You really are totally ignorant aren’t you. Can you actually support anything you’ve just said?
You seem to characterise the left as one monolithic block which is just not true even in the slightest.
On your specific points re socialist experiments well I hate to point it out but socialist experiments have involved a wide range of social justice issues way beyond just communes. That’s a very narrow framing of socialism that’s ignored the much wider picture. For example single payer health care systems, the welfare state are two policy examples which are extremely popular in countries that use them. What’s more in terms of health care the US has the worst health care outcomes and is the least efficient health care system in GDP terms compared to first world countries.
You have a very slap dash way of applying perjorative terms to the left.
1) wealthy individuals in left leaning countries. You are going to have to specific. But in principle the wealth gap in the US as I understand it is considerably worse than most comparable examples
2) eugenics – what ? If you are referring to Nazis then they weren’t socialist to blandly conclude that they were based on the name is truely astounding given the historic context of Nazis literally hating socialists.
3) Establishing abortion against blacks – wow that’s a crack pot theory. That doesn’t remotely characterise the ethical position that some on the left might take. Nor does it reflect the realities of abortion as used generally or specifically.
4) prohibition – I assume you are referring to the inter war prohibition of alcohol. That was dominated by left thing that was a religious position imposed on society. It had nothing to do with socialism. There were characters within both the democratic and Republican parties who might be described as progressives who endorsed the prohibition view but the primary driver was Christian beliefs at the time.
It’s quite clear you have totally misunderstood the left, progressives, the historical context, the historical ideas, and the contemporary ideas involved with progressives and socialism in general.
Socialists tend to argue in terms of specific policies in order to achieve a equal and just world. No honest socialist can claim to have all the answers but to sit back and say yeah it’s a bit shit but no policy will work is both defeatist and not empirically true.
So why is anyone surprised by this. Now that the democrats control two branches of government (legislative, executive) the democrat party needs to stage a takeover of the third and last branch that might be able to put a halt to most of their illegal actions and legislation (judicial). Once democrats control the legislative, executive and judicial (I have little hope the republicans will do anything to prevent it from happening) anything the democrat party does from that point on will be de facto legal.
Court packing is a serious threat that the GOP needs to go all out against in the mid-term elections. If the Democrats pack the court you can expect to see nothing but disastrous court rulings. Firearms and the 2nd Amendment would be among the first targets. If you really want to push states into thinking about secession have a SCOTUS that will rule the Democrat Party way on every issue.
Also while I want Breyer to have a ling life I would laugh my ass off if he didn’t leave during a Biden term but when the GOP takes back the White House in 2024 that’s when he pulls a Ginsburg.
That’s a joke, right? Most republicans are still pissing and moaning and beating the well and truly dead horse of 2020 election fraud and haven’t given the 2022 midterm election any thought or planning at all. And if republicans don’t retake the Senate or at least break the insane 50/50 tie with Harris casting the winning vote (wink, wink) then nothing else matters. The bogus “Election Reform” legislation will be pushed through and that will be it for free and honest elections. The republicans might as well not even bother fielding a candidate in the 2024 presidential election if they make no headway in the 2022 midterm election. There will literally be no reason to field an opposition candidate. And that’s the ugly truth of the matter.
Part of this is a campaign to intimidate how the justices will vote in the future, even if the packing does not happen.. But since the court has already ruled against any Trump-related cases, there is little reason for the left to fear this court’s future decisions.
Obviously, that is not enough.
Someone should remind liberals that it doesn’t say a lot of things in the Constitution like:
-A woman has a right to an abortion
-There are 86 genders (or however many you want each idea)
-A cell phone and the internet are a basic human right
-The right to bear arms shall be infringed
-The right to harvest and steal votes shall not be infringed
What ? If it is t in the constitution then by definition unless it’s legislated against it’s fine. I don’t see how it’s anyone’s business to legislate against abortion either.
That was the point marky…try to keep up
The quote by the MSNBC writer made a false dichotomy between what Breyer can rightfully stand for and only what is explicit in the Constitution.
Of course, you don’t see it. You don’t see a lot of things…that’s been established many times over.
No comment about the 2nd amendment I noticed.
If that was your intention with your comment fair enough.
Well I could have ranged about the 2nd amendment but I don’t really have strong views on that. It’s quite a different argument compared to abortion. I find legislation to ban/severely limit abortion morally repugnant.
*ranted not ranged
Are you really this ill-informed? There is NO legislation that can “legislate against” the Constitution. The only thing the legislature can do to “legislate against” the Constitution or any of its elements is to pass an Amendment to the Constitution, a purposefully onerous task that has little chance of success. You do understand this, right? You do know that the Supreme Court is there to prevent its co-equal branches (the legislative and executive) from violating the Constitution by “legislating against” its requirement that our fundamental and inherent rights and freedoms are not infringed?
“Legislating against” any of the protected freedoms enumerated in the Constitution is, by definition, unconstituional and will be overturned by the Supremes . . . if it even passes through Congress and gets signed into law by the executive.
SCOTUS does get things wrong (like Roe v. Wade), but they get a lot right, most recently rejecting California’s restriction of religious freedom.
Your ignorance is stunning.
You missed my point which is where the constitution is silent then sure there can be legislation. The question of interpreting the constitution obviously comes into play and I’m sure there are plenty of specific examples where it’s debated over what the constitution logically entails but the principle as a general rule remains true.
I’m also laughing at the 6-3 “Hard right” take by MSNBC. Have they not watched the last few decisions?
We’re about to become a one-party nation.
Still won’t discuss secession before the US military’s guns are trained on us?
No.
If you think it matters a whole lot what order that occurs in, you’ve analyzed the problem badly.
It’s difficult to see how any Democrat would support court packing without a belief that by doing so it might become possible to secure a federal government that remained under Democratic control forever.
For if one did not believe this then they’d have to realize that court-packing would inevitably become a permanent feature of politics whenever control of government shifted from one party to the other, and thus create a Supreme Court that could only become increasingly disorderly and incoherent as its size increased without limit.
Court-packing seems an obvious loser unless it could somehow be done only once. And how could that happen unless the party that packed the court was then to secure and retain permanent control of government?
You can see where Leftist group think is going in real time, I think once the hive decides something all will work to achieve it.
If the D’s believe the Republican justices are ruling based on their partisanship … then in packing the court with Democrat justices … says that the D’s want the Democrat justices to also rule based on their partisanship.
To the D’s … it’s a case of Republican partisanship is wrong and evil … but Democrat Partisanship is just and right.
Packing the court is a statement that law doesn’t matter and that partisanship does. This act will only serve to bring more politics into the decisions of the court.
Someone needs to go ahead and file suit now to prohibit court packing by the Democrats. Like the stolen election, once they have taken the action, no court will disavow their “right” to subvert the Constitutional Republic and this nation will cease to exist. I fear the Democrats are doing everything in their power to instigate WW3 in hopes that true Americans will rise up against the totalitarians currently in power in Congress and the empty suit in the White House.
File suit based on what? There’s no question at all that Congress does have the right to pack the court, if it chooses to do so. If the Dems can get majorities in both houses, and overcome a filibuster in the senate, they can do it. That they shouldn’t isn’t something a court can address. The only place the fight can possibly be held is where it belongs, in congress.
Now the valley cried with anger
Mount your horses draw your sword
And they killed the mountain people
So they won their just reward
Now they stood beside the treasure
On the mountain dark and red
Turned the stone and looked beneath it
Peace on earth
Was all it said
The Democrat motto is “By any means necessary”. There will be a full media press to back them up.
The American Democrat Red Guards are displeased with white supremacist sympathizing, running dog, old man Breyer.
A virtual struggle session has been planned and organized. CNN will televise and broadcast the ‘townhall’ meeting.