Count Jonathan Turley out if you’re among the Democrats who want to pack the U.S. Supreme Court with new liberal justices in 2021. Turley explains his opposition at TheHill.com.
Subtlety has long been a stranger to our politics. This is the age of rage, and there is little room for nuance. That is evident in the intense debate over the nomination of Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court. …
… What today’s politicians are advocating, however, is a direct litmus test. Not only will they vote against a nominee who opposes a particular case but they will do so for a nominee who does not expressly support a case. The calls for a litmus test are not just confined to the United States Supreme Court: …
… Even if a nominee like Barrett has a deep-seated, good-faith foundation in the law, it is her expected vote — not her explained views — that will matter. Such conditional voting was rejected long before the Ginsburg rule. Presidents since Ronald Reagan have pledged not to apply litmus tests, and past Senates — under both Republican and Democratic control — have maintained it is improper to demand an assurance on particular cases or claims. …
… For the court-packing scheme proposed by vice presidential candidate Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) and others to work, there must be some form of litmus test. Democrats have pledged to add six new justices to guarantee a court that will vote to uphold or overturn cases as expected. Absent such guarantees, court-packing is a futile exercise; the whole point is to force outcomes like voting to uphold Roe. This court-packing rationalization has reached truly Orwellian levels, with former White House counsel John Dean insisting that, by manufacturing a new ideological court majority, Democrats would “depoliticize” it.
Litmus-testing and court-packing would “honor” Ginsburg by destroying the court she loved. It would obliterate an institution that has preserved this country’s stability and continuity.
