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The Supreme Court’s Latest Decisions Have the Legitimacy of a Mitch McConnell Press Release
The court’s power lies in its legitimacy, which is now gone.
In 2016 Mitch McConnell said, “I’m not going to hold a vote for President Obama’s nominee, Merrick Garland, to the Supreme Court,” see such and such precedents.
McConnell cited a bunch of precedents from the 19th century that went something like, “here’s the last time an opposing party considered a Supreme Court nomination in an election year.”
Four years later, when Justice Ginsburg died, Trump’s pick, Amy Coney Barrett, was confirmed a mere 10 days before the 2020 election to replace her seat. McConnell did a 180 and said, well, I can distinguish that precedent from this precedent.
What McConnell did here was to engage in “analysis.” McConnell came up with that analysis using precedents to establish a rule.
The rule is clear to everyone, “if my party is in control, then ten days before an election is cool, but when my party is not in control, ten months before an election is not okay.”
This is the same kind of analysis the current Supreme Court is engaged in; they are making up rules to fit their ideology and politics based on cherry-picking precedents. Whatever…
