Obama should have his AG draft a bill to expand the Supreme Court

[redstate_democrat]

Since the number of judges on the Supreme Court isn't set by the Constitution and rather by legislation, he should have the number raised to 11. :evilgrin:

[onenote]

1. He most definitely should not

The criticism, based on the failed historical precedent of FDR's court packing plan, would be deafening.

Fortunately, its not anything to worry about, since Obama and his team is far far too smart to do anything so self-destructive.

[redstate_democrat]

3. One can dream.

:evilgrin:

But his court packing plan helped "switch" the court's rabid defiance against FDR and his plans to help the economy through New Deal legislation. Before then, the court was only interested in helping wealthy property owners protect what was theirs. When FDR threatened to raise the court to 13 members, then all of a sudden the court started saying the government could regulate in areas of the economy.

Hmm. I believe some arm twisting like that could also be in order pretty soon.

[JaneQPublic]

4. Yeah, FDR would probably advise against it, based on personal experience.

[Posteritatis]

7. Not to mention SCOTUS being way too politicised as it stands.. (nt)

[Ganja Ninja]

2. I agree with that.

We need control of all 3 branches of government.

[dflprincess]

5. There's no guarantee that the judges a president appoints will behave the way the preident expected.

Earl Warren surprised Eisenhower.

[redstate_democrat]

6. That's true, but how often does that happen?

[WI_DEM]

20. Let's see Brennan suprised Eisenhower, too, Byron White surprised JFK,

Lewis Powell surprised Ford, on the whole I'm sure Sandra Day O'Connor wasn't nearly as conservative as Reagan hoped. I'm sure that Souter was a big shock to Bush. So it happens quite a bit.

[Ganja Ninja]

8. A man that was elected under such dubious circumstances as George W Bush ...

should not be able to leave his stamp on the SC for years after he leaves office.

[Spider Jerusalem]

12. David Souter is a more recent example.

Bush Senior was expecting a conservative along the lines of Rehnquist or Scalia.

[Hippo_Tron]

17. That's because John Sununu was a gullible idiot

Souter had no record whatsoever but Sununu just assumed he would be a conservative and then sold Bush on him. Obama will take his Supreme Court appointments far more seriously.

[LynneSin]

9. If I could change ONE thing about the Supreme Court - it's that a new Chief Justice is picked....

by each Administration. Roberts was good for Bush but I think I would rather see Souter running it for us under Obama.

[charlie and algernon]

10. abso-fucking-lutely NOT

Let's not repeat FDR's stupid, failed idea

[drm604]

11. It sets a bad precedent.

Every time the executive branch changes parties the court will grow further in size. It could become rather unwieldy after a while.

[stopbush]

13. These ones go to eleven!

[Max_powers94]

14. The captain and number one is very displease with your post

[redstate_democrat]

15. Why? I say fuck it

Let's go balls to the walls on the Rethugs. :evilgrin:

Besides, the Rethugs on the Supreme Court seem to be too cozy with their little situation. Like Sarah Palin would say, "Let's go to Washington and shake things up!!11!" :evilgrin:

[iceman66]

16. A better idea might be . . .

If we could conclusively establish, via Congressional investigation, the illegitimacy of Bush's "election", Roberts and Alito could be pressured to resign and/or removed.

[Freddie Stubbs]

22. LIke it or not, Bush was 'elected' in 2004

I'm not talking about the popular vote. And I'm not talking about what happened in Ohio. The Constitution makes no mention of that. The Electoral vote is the only one that counts as far as who is President, and any chance to challenge that ended when Congress voted to accept the results.

[iceman66]

24. If it could be PROVEN that Diebold threw the '04 election to Bush

that might spark enough of a public outcry to warrant removing these horrible "justices".

That is assuming that Congress will even have the balls to investigate Diebold, which unfortunately seems unlikely!

[onenote]

28. it would no more spark an outcry to remove them than any of the 100s of other judges

and other bush appointees who have terms that run past the end of his presidency, or the legitimacy of any legislation signed by chimpy etc.

So even if it could be proven that the election was stolen, the results, and the consequences, are not going to change retroactively. The Senate confirmed those nomineees. The Senate and House passed the bills chimpy signed. They're done.

[ramapo]

18. Awful idea

Good way for him to destroy his presidency before he even gets started. Just a dumb idea. Reference FDR if you don't know why.

[WI_DEM]

21. Couldn't agree more this is not a fight that Obama needs to start his presidency with

besides we should have about three vacancies in the next year or so.

[Bake]

30. By the end of O's second term, SCOTUS should be 6-3 in our favor

I figure the only cons left on the bench will be Alito, Roberts, and maybe Thomas. All the rest will be gone, replaced by President Obama nominees.

Bake

[WI_DEM]

19. FDR at the peak of his popularity tried this with the same arguement and

he was rebuffed and democrats had many more members of the congress than they do now.

[totodeinhere]

23. You want Obama to repeat one of the two biggest mistakes that FDR ever made.

Of course the other mistake was agreeing to the internment of Japanese Americans.

[Occam Bandage]

26. Give it another week or two.

There'll be DUers calling on Obama to throw Republicans in camps soon enough. The prospect of Democratic power is going to their heads.

[Occam Bandage]

25. We tried that once. It was a terrible idea. Let's not repeat the mistakes of the past. nt

[blue_onyx]

27. NO!! This is a horrible idea

We should just focus on electing Democratic presidents so we get liberal justices that right way. If Obama added justices, then the next Republican could add or subtract the number of justices needed to get a conservative majority. It would be a mess.

[RamboLiberal]

29. Wow - some here sure like to give ammunition to Limpballs & company

FDR learned the hard way this won't fly!

Be honest, how would you have reacted if Bush had tried this?