Supreme Court reform in the United States
The Supreme Court holds high importance in the American system as the final judicial check on both legislative and executive power.
The debates around reform hinge on the counter-majoritarian difficulty, a feature of the American governmental system in which one branch (the judiciary) can overrule the will of the majority.
The debate over Supreme Court reform is commented on in academic, judicial, executive, and legislative circles in the United States.
The section's ambiguity leaves ample room for Congress to operate in administering the Court, and the legislature has historically vacillated in how it sets up the body.
The Constitution outlays the counter-majoritarian difficulty as a feature of the governmental system, allowing a small, unelected body to temper the popular will.
When operating perfectly, the antidemocratic Supreme Court should keep the democratic process on the right track against fleeting popular passions.
Andrew Jackson looked to curtail judicial overreach in opposition to big government, Abraham Lincoln wanted to ensure anti-slavery principles, FDR attempted to push through New Deal legislation by means of SCOTUS reform, Ronald Reagan appointed justices like Robert Bork to inject specific ideological constitutional interpretation, and Joe Biden created a commission to explore reform.
It’s politically motivated proposals that draw the ire of the general public, however, politicians rarely float reforms to solve structural problems of the Court like efficiency or workload.
Some commentators assessed that the best way to withhold power from a future president was by filling a larger bench with more liberal justices.
Some scholars also see expansion as a way to include a larger variety of viewpoints on the judicial bench by incorporating jurists from various disciplines.
They argue packing the Court undermines the political process by disregarding the fact that a president who appoints a controversial justice does so only with the electoral support of the American people.
Ironically, these term limits are the most constitutionally dubious of all reforms, for one of the few specifications of Article III Section 1 is that justices shall serve during good behavior.
As noted in the Presidential Commission on SCOTUS Reform report, the United States is the only constitutional democracy in the world to allow lifetime appointments.
Two, it would maintain the independence that justices currently hold on the bench, potentially decreasing their responsiveness to political pressure by eliminating the need for strategic retirements.
The crux of the reform is making it more difficult for the unelected Supreme Court to invalidate the actions of the elected branches of the federal government.
Proponents of this system argue that the reform would provide additional deference to the elected branches of government, legislative and executive.
Proponents point to recent 5–4 decisions on important constitutional questions as examples of a judiciary that decides on too slim margins, not exhibiting enough consensus.
Opponents identify that this proposal could cut against one of the key roles of the Supreme Court, resisting majoritarian overreach as an antidemocratic body.
Opponents raise similar rejoinders to those against supermajority rules: instituting this practice would eliminate the counter-majoritarianism that the Court aims to foster.
The first decisions of the body were mostly to determine administrative procedure, and the Court continued, enervated, until the appointment of John Marshall as chief justice.
In 1801, the John Adams administration supported the immensely political Midnight Judges Act, a piece of legislation to organize more conveniently the federal court system.
While the Act eliminated circuit riding, Adams looked to curtail judicial power by reducing the size of the Court to five justices.
[11] In 1937, President Franklin Roosevelt was struck time and again by Supreme Court rulings unfavorable to his expansionary New Deal legislation aimed at alleviating the strains of the Great Depression.
His solution to this problem was introducing a bill to expand the size of the Supreme Court, appointing his own justices and reducing the individual influence of the others.
