Although the 1869 act, enacted one month after the inauguration of President Ulysses S. Grant — Johnson’s successor — restored to nine both the number of circuits and Supreme Court seats, the episode set off alarm bells.
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On this, the 1869 act’s sesquicentennial, it’s worth reflecting on how we ended up with nine justices — and why recent proposals that.Recent proposals that Democrats should expand the size of the court are dangerously myopic.The Constitution, perhaps surprisingly, says nothing about how many justices should serve on the Supreme Court.The text contemplates at least one — a chief justice — to preside over a president’s impeachment trial. Second, splitting the difference may be—but is not in general—the outcome of a future bargaining game among an even number of members. On the other hand if it was one of the Democratic candidates I could be more Buddhist,Supreme Court Appointments as a Move-the-Median Game,Adversarial Legalism: The American Way of Law,Keep The Supreme Court Bench Even-Numbered. (Krehbiel, pp. Hart, Jr., The Power of Congress to Limit the Jurisdiction of Federal Courts: An Exercise in Dialectic, 66 HARV. And having one hundred justices would be unwieldy: do you realize how long the bench would need to be?Since Nicholas’s paper focuses on the legal justification, not the policy one, that’s the end of it. A. For example, imagine that we no longer attempt, with seemingly only limited success anyway, to have politically independent justices.
In 1937, Roosevelt had won a second term in office, but the makeup of a conservative-leaning Supreme Court hadn’t changed since he took office four years earlier. “Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the supreme court of the United States shall consist of a chief justice and five associate justices, any four of whom shall be a quorum, and shall hold annually at the seat of government two sessions, the one commencing the first Monday of February, and the other the first Monday of August,” the act read.Since 1789, Congress changed the maximum number of Justices on the Court several times. The Court was expanded to five justices in 1862. [“Fast”, as discussed below, is a relative term.] Indeed, that Congress has not revisited the size of the court in 150 years is a powerful testament to just how ingrained the norm of nine has become — and how concerned different political constituencies have been at different times about preserving the court’s power.To be sure, there are some who see the addition of two new seats to the court.Not only do two wrongs not make a right, though, but once Congress gets back into the business of messing with the size of the court, it’s impossible to imagine it stopping. Why there are 9 though is a matter of practicality based on the workload of the Supreme Court. But when looking backward, a 100-year struggle can seem relatively short from a historical point of view.If we look at some of the cases where the Court came to a 5-4 decision, we are all likely to find some outcomes with which we (strongly) agree, and some with which we (strongly) disagree.What would happen if we changed that dynamic to hold off on that method of dispute resolution? Researchers have carefully analyzed the judicial rulings of the Supreme Court—the votes and written opinions of the justices—as well as their upbringing, their political party affiliation, their speeches, editorials written about them at the time of their Senate confirmation, and the political climate in which they are appointed, confirmed, and work. 0000001624 00000 n
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This insightful study deepens our understanding of law and its relationship to politics in America and raises valuable questions about the future of the American legal system.By comparison, a Buddhist notion of conflict involves recognizing our own contributions to a dispute. I could wait it out no problem if it wasn’t Trump or someone equal. 246 0 obj
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Although the 1869 act, enacted one month after the inauguration of President Ulysses S. Grant — Johnson’s successor — restored to nine both the number of circuits and Supreme Court seats, the episode set off alarm bells.
0000032592 00000 n
On this, the 1869 act’s sesquicentennial, it’s worth reflecting on how we ended up with nine justices — and why recent proposals that.Recent proposals that Democrats should expand the size of the court are dangerously myopic.The Constitution, perhaps surprisingly, says nothing about how many justices should serve on the Supreme Court.The text contemplates at least one — a chief justice — to preside over a president’s impeachment trial. Second, splitting the difference may be—but is not in general—the outcome of a future bargaining game among an even number of members. On the other hand if it was one of the Democratic candidates I could be more Buddhist,Supreme Court Appointments as a Move-the-Median Game,Adversarial Legalism: The American Way of Law,Keep The Supreme Court Bench Even-Numbered. (Krehbiel, pp. Hart, Jr., The Power of Congress to Limit the Jurisdiction of Federal Courts: An Exercise in Dialectic, 66 HARV. And having one hundred justices would be unwieldy: do you realize how long the bench would need to be?Since Nicholas’s paper focuses on the legal justification, not the policy one, that’s the end of it. A. For example, imagine that we no longer attempt, with seemingly only limited success anyway, to have politically independent justices.
In 1937, Roosevelt had won a second term in office, but the makeup of a conservative-leaning Supreme Court hadn’t changed since he took office four years earlier. “Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the supreme court of the United States shall consist of a chief justice and five associate justices, any four of whom shall be a quorum, and shall hold annually at the seat of government two sessions, the one commencing the first Monday of February, and the other the first Monday of August,” the act read.Since 1789, Congress changed the maximum number of Justices on the Court several times. The Court was expanded to five justices in 1862. [“Fast”, as discussed below, is a relative term.] Indeed, that Congress has not revisited the size of the court in 150 years is a powerful testament to just how ingrained the norm of nine has become — and how concerned different political constituencies have been at different times about preserving the court’s power.To be sure, there are some who see the addition of two new seats to the court.Not only do two wrongs not make a right, though, but once Congress gets back into the business of messing with the size of the court, it’s impossible to imagine it stopping. Why there are 9 though is a matter of practicality based on the workload of the Supreme Court. But when looking backward, a 100-year struggle can seem relatively short from a historical point of view.If we look at some of the cases where the Court came to a 5-4 decision, we are all likely to find some outcomes with which we (strongly) agree, and some with which we (strongly) disagree.What would happen if we changed that dynamic to hold off on that method of dispute resolution? Researchers have carefully analyzed the judicial rulings of the Supreme Court—the votes and written opinions of the justices—as well as their upbringing, their political party affiliation, their speeches, editorials written about them at the time of their Senate confirmation, and the political climate in which they are appointed, confirmed, and work. 0000001624 00000 n
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This insightful study deepens our understanding of law and its relationship to politics in America and raises valuable questions about the future of the American legal system.By comparison, a Buddhist notion of conflict involves recognizing our own contributions to a dispute. I could wait it out no problem if it wasn’t Trump or someone equal. 246 0 obj
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Although the 1869 act, enacted one month after the inauguration of President Ulysses S. Grant — Johnson’s successor — restored to nine both the number of circuits and Supreme Court seats, the episode set off alarm bells.
0000032592 00000 n
On this, the 1869 act’s sesquicentennial, it’s worth reflecting on how we ended up with nine justices — and why recent proposals that.Recent proposals that Democrats should expand the size of the court are dangerously myopic.The Constitution, perhaps surprisingly, says nothing about how many justices should serve on the Supreme Court.The text contemplates at least one — a chief justice — to preside over a president’s impeachment trial. Second, splitting the difference may be—but is not in general—the outcome of a future bargaining game among an even number of members. On the other hand if it was one of the Democratic candidates I could be more Buddhist,Supreme Court Appointments as a Move-the-Median Game,Adversarial Legalism: The American Way of Law,Keep The Supreme Court Bench Even-Numbered. (Krehbiel, pp. Hart, Jr., The Power of Congress to Limit the Jurisdiction of Federal Courts: An Exercise in Dialectic, 66 HARV. And having one hundred justices would be unwieldy: do you realize how long the bench would need to be?Since Nicholas’s paper focuses on the legal justification, not the policy one, that’s the end of it. A. For example, imagine that we no longer attempt, with seemingly only limited success anyway, to have politically independent justices.
In 1937, Roosevelt had won a second term in office, but the makeup of a conservative-leaning Supreme Court hadn’t changed since he took office four years earlier. “Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the supreme court of the United States shall consist of a chief justice and five associate justices, any four of whom shall be a quorum, and shall hold annually at the seat of government two sessions, the one commencing the first Monday of February, and the other the first Monday of August,” the act read.Since 1789, Congress changed the maximum number of Justices on the Court several times. The Court was expanded to five justices in 1862. [“Fast”, as discussed below, is a relative term.] Indeed, that Congress has not revisited the size of the court in 150 years is a powerful testament to just how ingrained the norm of nine has become — and how concerned different political constituencies have been at different times about preserving the court’s power.To be sure, there are some who see the addition of two new seats to the court.Not only do two wrongs not make a right, though, but once Congress gets back into the business of messing with the size of the court, it’s impossible to imagine it stopping. Why there are 9 though is a matter of practicality based on the workload of the Supreme Court. But when looking backward, a 100-year struggle can seem relatively short from a historical point of view.If we look at some of the cases where the Court came to a 5-4 decision, we are all likely to find some outcomes with which we (strongly) agree, and some with which we (strongly) disagree.What would happen if we changed that dynamic to hold off on that method of dispute resolution? Researchers have carefully analyzed the judicial rulings of the Supreme Court—the votes and written opinions of the justices—as well as their upbringing, their political party affiliation, their speeches, editorials written about them at the time of their Senate confirmation, and the political climate in which they are appointed, confirmed, and work. 0000001624 00000 n
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This insightful study deepens our understanding of law and its relationship to politics in America and raises valuable questions about the future of the American legal system.By comparison, a Buddhist notion of conflict involves recognizing our own contributions to a dispute. I could wait it out no problem if it wasn’t Trump or someone equal. 246 0 obj
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Is having an odd number of justices important to the makeup of the court
by
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The battle over court packing isn't about partisan politics. 0000007186 00000 n
In 1937, Roosevelt had won a second term in office, but the makeup of a conservative-leaning Supreme Court hadn’t changed since he took office four years earlier. 6-7, footnotes removed).That is, the assumption in the model is that with a split on an even-numbered court, no compromise opinion will (ever) form. And so we have three options: 1) flee from the messiness of those contradictions, 2) take sides and fight against them, or 3) simply hold the tension in our heart until we and the world around us are transformed. Under the current 1879 constitution, the Court expanded to six associate justices and one chief justice, for the current total of seven.
Steve is co-editor-in-chief of the Just Security blog (@just_security) and co-host of the National Security Law Podcast (@nslpodcast).The Constitution doesn't prevent Congress from court-packing.
These "circuit courts" are different from the "circuit courts" we have today. (.When looking forward, 10 years is interminable. So why are there nine seats on the Court, and who set that precedent?The Judiciary Act of 1789 established the first Supreme Court, with six Justices. Or is it?
Although the 1869 act, enacted one month after the inauguration of President Ulysses S. Grant — Johnson’s successor — restored to nine both the number of circuits and Supreme Court seats, the episode set off alarm bells.
0000032592 00000 n
On this, the 1869 act’s sesquicentennial, it’s worth reflecting on how we ended up with nine justices — and why recent proposals that.Recent proposals that Democrats should expand the size of the court are dangerously myopic.The Constitution, perhaps surprisingly, says nothing about how many justices should serve on the Supreme Court.The text contemplates at least one — a chief justice — to preside over a president’s impeachment trial. Second, splitting the difference may be—but is not in general—the outcome of a future bargaining game among an even number of members. On the other hand if it was one of the Democratic candidates I could be more Buddhist,Supreme Court Appointments as a Move-the-Median Game,Adversarial Legalism: The American Way of Law,Keep The Supreme Court Bench Even-Numbered. (Krehbiel, pp. Hart, Jr., The Power of Congress to Limit the Jurisdiction of Federal Courts: An Exercise in Dialectic, 66 HARV. And having one hundred justices would be unwieldy: do you realize how long the bench would need to be?Since Nicholas’s paper focuses on the legal justification, not the policy one, that’s the end of it. A. For example, imagine that we no longer attempt, with seemingly only limited success anyway, to have politically independent justices.
In 1937, Roosevelt had won a second term in office, but the makeup of a conservative-leaning Supreme Court hadn’t changed since he took office four years earlier. “Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the supreme court of the United States shall consist of a chief justice and five associate justices, any four of whom shall be a quorum, and shall hold annually at the seat of government two sessions, the one commencing the first Monday of February, and the other the first Monday of August,” the act read.Since 1789, Congress changed the maximum number of Justices on the Court several times. The Court was expanded to five justices in 1862. [“Fast”, as discussed below, is a relative term.] Indeed, that Congress has not revisited the size of the court in 150 years is a powerful testament to just how ingrained the norm of nine has become — and how concerned different political constituencies have been at different times about preserving the court’s power.To be sure, there are some who see the addition of two new seats to the court.Not only do two wrongs not make a right, though, but once Congress gets back into the business of messing with the size of the court, it’s impossible to imagine it stopping. Why there are 9 though is a matter of practicality based on the workload of the Supreme Court. But when looking backward, a 100-year struggle can seem relatively short from a historical point of view.If we look at some of the cases where the Court came to a 5-4 decision, we are all likely to find some outcomes with which we (strongly) agree, and some with which we (strongly) disagree.What would happen if we changed that dynamic to hold off on that method of dispute resolution? Researchers have carefully analyzed the judicial rulings of the Supreme Court—the votes and written opinions of the justices—as well as their upbringing, their political party affiliation, their speeches, editorials written about them at the time of their Senate confirmation, and the political climate in which they are appointed, confirmed, and work. 0000001624 00000 n
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This insightful study deepens our understanding of law and its relationship to politics in America and raises valuable questions about the future of the American legal system.By comparison, a Buddhist notion of conflict involves recognizing our own contributions to a dispute. I could wait it out no problem if it wasn’t Trump or someone equal. 246 0 obj
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