Hardball

Sept. 29, 2020

It is obvious that Republicans are playing hardball to win at any cost, while Democrats are playing slow pitch softball with one hand tied behind their back.

The Constitution does not specify the number of justices on the Supreme Court. So if the Republicans toss out the rules they made four years ago and confirm another Supreme Court Justice, the Democrats have every right to change the rules, too. Whether they have the gumption to do it is another matter.

“…Congress has changed the size of the Supreme Court seven times, from the original six justices to as many as 10 in 1863. After the Civil War, Congress in 1866 reduced the number of justices to seven to prevent President Andrew Johnson from appointing new members to the court. In 1869, after Johnson left office, Congress raised the number of justices back to nine, which the court has numbered ever since.

During the Great Depression, conservatives on the court struck down several New Deal programs during President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s first term. After his sweeping re-election in 1936, Roosevelt proposed in 1937 that Congress increase the number of judges to as many as 15 members.

FDR relented when one of the justices moderated to allow the laws to take effect, and another conservative judge retired, prompting a humorist to quip, ‘A switch in time saved nine’.”

James M. Cullen, in an editorial in “The Progressive Populist” 

10/15/2020

I would have expected such a threat from Bernie or AOC. I have my doubts about Biden or Pelosi or Schumer.

But the option is there, if they take the Senate and the Presidency.