Why don't we just ignore the Supreme Court?

[Cyrano]

Maureen Dowd's op ed in the NY Times closes with the above question. After all, we have a Court that appointed George W. president in 2000; gutted the Voting Rights Act, and is licking it's chops over the upcoming Roe V Wade case. The wingnuts that dominate the Court, (and have for decades), don't give a rat's ass about the law, the Constitution, or the well being of the vast majority of the American people

The answer to her question is that we (Democrats) obey Supreme Court decisions out of tradition. But what if they make a decision that Republicans hate. Would they obey it? After all, the SCOTUS has no enforcement powers.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/09/opinion/supreme-court-conservative.html

[MineralMan]

1. That's easier said than done, I'm afraid.

If you're an average person, not in any position of authority, you can personally ignore the Supreme Court, because what it does generally doesn't affect you 99% of the time.

However, if you're an elected official, you really can't ignore it. That's especially true if you're a legislator. The SCOTUS can make your legislation go away as invalid and unconstitutional, so you always have to be aware of constitutional issues, and the SCOTUS is the sole arbiter of that.

The SCOTUS might not affect your life, unless you are a woman, a voter, a person of color, or breathe regularly. Then, you might have to deal with some decision made by that court. That's the problem.

[Cyrano]

5. What if, the SCOTUS says Roe V Wade is the law of the land and

Governor Abbot says, "It's not the law of Texas," and bans all abortions in the state?

What can the Court do? Perhaps the DOJ can do something, but I don't know.

[MineralMan]

8. Governors don't make laws. They sign them.

Legislatures make laws. State and federal. While states sometimes flout the US Constitution, that never works for long. Remember Alabama trying to keep its schools segregated? That didn't work.

[Cyrano]

11. This is a different era

I understand exactly what you're saying, Mineral Man. And so do most thinking Americans.

However, we have a Republican Party that isn't playing by any rules, or by our Constitution. This is, of course, the crisis that the pundits are talking about.

So what do we do when we have a slow-motion coup d' tat taking place and our resistance to it is pitiful? I really don't know.

[MineralMan]

15. What do we do? We vote as though much

Depends on it. We help others vote, too. What else?

[elleng]

2. 'Worcester v. Georgia, 31 U.S. (6 Pet.) 515 (1832), was a landmark case

in which the United States Supreme Court vacated the conviction of Samuel Worcester and held that the Georgia criminal statute that prohibited non-Native Americans from being present on Native American lands without a license from the state was unconstitutional.

The opinion is most famous for its dicta, which laid out the relationship between tribes and the state and federal governments. It is considered to have built the foundations of the doctrine of tribal sovereignty in the United States. . .

In a popular quotation that is believed to be apocryphal, President Andrew Jackson reportedly responded: "John Marshall has made his decision; now let him enforce it!"[5][6] This quotation first appeared twenty years after Jackson had died, in newspaper publisher Horace Greeley's 1865 history of the U.S. Civil War, The American Conflict.[6] It was, however, reported in the press in March 1832 that Jackson was unlikely to aid in carrying out the court's decision if his assistance were to be requested.[7] In an April 1832 letter to John Coffee, Jackson wrote that "the decision of the Supreme Court has fell still born, and they find that they cannot coerce Georgia to yield to its mandate."[5][8] In a letter in March 1832, Virginia politician David Campbell reported a private conversation in which Jackson had "sportively" suggested calling on the Massachusetts state militia to enforce the order if the Supreme Court requested he intervene, because Jackson believed Northern partisans had brought about the court's ruling.[8]

The Court did not ask federal marshals to carry out the decision.[9] Worcester thus imposed no obligations on Jackson;'>>>

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worcester_v._Georgia

[brooklynite]

3. No we DON'T obey the Supreme Court out of "tradition"...

…we obey it as part of our Constitutional Government. It’s depressing how many people are willing to say “Trump didn’t obey the law so we don’t either”.

[MichMan]

4. After that we should just ignore the legislature as well

Won't matter what Manchin, Sinema, or McConnell have to say about anything.

[Cyrano]

6. Well, for the most part, the TFG and the Republicans

spent four years ignoring many of the laws of the land. And what's been done about it? To date, not much.

[KentuckyWoman]

7. I'd rather keep fighting like hell to fix it.

[abqtommy]

9. Thanks. I agree. nt

[FBaggins]

10. And expect who to vote for us next time?

But wait… elections boards don’t have anyone enforcing their decisions either. Maybe we can just ignore them too?

Starting to sound at all familiar?

[gab13by13]

12. Bingo,

nothing matters unless S1 gets passed.

[Polybius]

13. Name a President who did it in the last 200 years

Besides Andrew Jackson, Lincoln maybe? That's it.

[joetheman]

14. You mean like the GOP does? nt