SCOTUS hears the case on Trump's eligibility on February 8, 2024

[mjmartin]

Decision is out. Trump can stay on the ballot.

https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/04/politics/trump-supreme-court-colorado-14th-amendment/index.html

[JRDelirious]

Discussion also under way in the thread about state disqualifications

Various states, including Colorado, determine Trump is disqualified from holding office

This. What it comes down to is that it’ll only be enforced against someone whose party doesn’t hold either the House or the Senate. That isn’t what it might have meant 50 years ago; but that’s what it means now. Quite possibly; but they’re not going to do so now, because I doubt you’d get the Senate to agree to anything that the House would. If we get a blue sweep, we might get legislation before 2028; but we’d have to get the blue sweep first, without it, this year. If we get a red sweep, …

[PhillyGuy]

Supreme Betrayal: A requiem for Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment By J. Michael Luttig and Laurence H. Tribe

Hard to summarize, and behind a weak paywall. I agree with all of it.

Nothing about letting an individual state initiate the disqualification process ever threatened to create what the unanimous Court called a “patchwork” of divergent state resolutions of the controlling federal questions of what constitutes a disqualifying “insurrection” and whether the former president had “engaged” in one. From the outset, the hand-wringing about how no state should be empowered to rule over its sister states on the national question as to who might run for president was all smoke and mirrors, manifestly predicated on a demonstrably false premise about the way our judicial system works. . . .

. . . the week-long trial by the Colorado state court, which had indisputable jurisdiction to consider the matter, undoubtedly more than satisfied the constitutional requirements for disqualifying the former president under Section 3. At that trial, he was afforded every opportunity to defend himself against the charge that he had personally “engaged” in an “insurrection or rebellion” against the Constitution. Not a single justice suggested that the process was less than what the former president was due. That trial ended in a finding by “clear and convincing evidence” that he had not only engaged in that insurrection but had orchestrated the entire months-long effort to obstruct the joint session’s official proceeding, preventing the peaceful transfer of power for the first time in American history. Not a single justice suggested that a more stringent standard of proof was required . . .

If Trump wins, as a man who already said he will be a day one dictator, he is going to ignore court decisions. Then, when it is too late, a bunch of these justices will realize they should have followed their pledge to support the Constitution without fear of favor.

[DesertDog]

At best they have forever branded the court as political forever after. It was but a fig leaf before. Now they will get, and deserve, all the opprobrium that… profession gets.

[DrDeth]

@PhillyGuy

Then, when it is too late, a bunch of these justices will realize they should have followed their pledge to support the Constitution without fear of favor.

It was an Unanimous decision. Even trumps foes said NO.

[PhillyGuy]

By doubling-down on his support for the insurrection, Trump is making a mockery of SCOTUS’s refusal to enforce Section 3:

Please rise for horribly and unfairly treated January 6th hostages.

[Aspenglow]

@DrDeth

It was an Unanimous decision. Even trumps foes said NO.

This is misleading. What all SCOTUS judges agreed on was that one state should not decide who is on the ballot for the entire country. Beyond that single point, there was divergence and dissenting opinions. According to court watchers, the decision was more like (wait for it) 5-4.

[PhillyGuy]

@Aspenglow

Beyond that single point, there was divergence and dissenting opinions.

I’m sure you know this, but what you are calling dissenting opinions avoid use of the word dissent. Instead they use the phrase “concurring in the judgment.”

Before I possibly say more about that, I have a question. How many precedents, if any, are there for Supreme Court decisions where there was evident lack of full unanimity, and the word dissent is never used to label the questioning viewpoint(s)?

There have been non-unanimous opinions where the dissenters just didn’t bother writing anything (Jacobson v. Massachusetts). I’m rather asking about whether there are precedents where the dissenters wrote something that sounds like a dissent, or a dissenting in part, but declined to label it that way.

[Aspenglow]

@PhillyGuy

I’m sure you know this, but what you are calling dissenting opinions avoid use of the word dissent. Instead they use the phrase “concurring in the judgment.”

Well, they didn’t avoid using that term in the analysis I heard given by legal experts when this was under discussion.

@PhillyGuy

How many precedents, if any, are there for Supreme Court decisions where there was evident lack of full unanimity, and the word dissent is never used to label the questioning viewpoint(s)?

Sorry, I don’t have enough time in the world to research this. Nor do I care.

[enipla]

I know that precedents are a very important legal concept. But there are no precedents for what Trump has done and is doing.

IMHO, we/they need to start from scratch and create a NEW precedent that can be followed in the future.

Don’t try to overthrow the government okay? You will get yourself in a spot of trouble.

[Falchion]

@PhillyGuy

Before I possibly say more about that, I have a question. How many precedents, if any, are there for Supreme Court decisions where there was evident lack of full unanimity, and the word dissent is never used to label the questioning viewpoint(s)?

I don’t know the numbers, but it’s not shockingly uncommon. It’s sort of a technical concept. A “dissent” is dissent from the judgment. A concurrence is a concurrence in the judgment. Usually, we think of a concurrence as generally agreeing with the Court’s opinion. But that’s not always true, and referring to is at as “concurring in the judgment” emphasizes that. This is also how you wind up with plurality opinions or controlling concurrences.

Here, the Court was unanimous its judgment – that “the judgment of the Colorado Supreme Court is reversed.”

I’d go farther and say that the Court was unanimous in its holding that states cannot enforce Section 3 against federal officials (or, at least, the President).

The dispute is over who can do so. It’s misleading to call that a “dissent” (since it’s not related to the actual question before the Court), but it’s certainly a divergence of opinion.

[PhillyGuy]

@enipla

IMHO, we/they need to start from scratch and create a NEW precedent that can be followed in the future.

Don’t try to overthrow the government okay? You will get yourself in a spot of trouble.

I wonder if there are any precedents, in the world history of presidential republics having rule of law, for ordering the results of an election you lost to be reversed, and for your coup attempt to have failed, and, three years later, you are free, having never faced trial.

In terms of the thread, the GOP justices seem to have been successful in getting SCOTUS to avoid referencing international precedents. But when something so unprecedented, in U.S. history, as January 6 occurs, where someone disqualified by your constitution is running for the highest office, and you might need to make a sua sponte ruling to insure your constitution is abided by, looking at what other democracies may have done, makes sense.

[Saint_Cad]

@PhillyGuy

I wonder if there are any precedents, in the world history of presidential republics having rule of law, for ordering the results of an election you lost to be reversed, and for your coup attempt to have failed, and, three years later, you are free, having never faced trial.

emphasis added

That is not up to SCOTUS to correct. If there is an issue with Trump not being convicted of insurrection at the Federal level then blame Garland. Or blame the Senate that acquitted him. But under the separation of powers, SCOTUS hands are tied by the inaction of the other branches.

[PhillyGuy]

@Saint_Cad

That is not up to SCOTUS to correct.

Agreed.

In the sentence you quote of mine you quote, I was guilty of making a comment irrelevant to the thread topic.

But I think the rest of my last post was kosher.

[enipla]

@Saint_Cad

then blame Garland

On November 18, 2022, Jack Smith was appointed by Attorney General Merrick B. Garland to serve as the Special Counsel by Order No. 5559-2022.

Too little too late, I will agree. But Smith has a good record.