Kennedy is retiring
The swinging vote on the court, Anthony Kennedy, has announced his retirement. The other 8 justices, in highly political cases, tend to vote lock step. Though Roberts seems to have that penchant occasionally. Kennedy was the one who didn’t. When Heller was in the works, I remember talking to people about how it was a bit frightening that it came down to Kennedy, who had disappointed conservatives on several occasions with his vote. But I digress.
Here’s a list of Trump’s potential nominees. I’d like to see Mike Lee.
Maybe the new justice will allow the court to stop ignoring the “optional second amendment“.
June 27th, 2018 at 4:32 pm
I’d love to see Trump float Scott Pruitt’s name on Twitter. Just to cause heart attacks and take out a few of the lefties.
I agree. Mike Lee would be a great nominee.
June 27th, 2018 at 4:59 pm
It would be great to see someone, anyone, with discernible principles. Kennedy certainly never met a Constitutional principle he could appreciate or understand. The far-left extremists on the Court don’t respect the Constitution at all, but they do have principles one can understand (and despise). With Kennedy, on the other hand, you never have any clue what sort of bizarre stuff he might say.
June 27th, 2018 at 7:10 pm
I’d love to see Eugene Volokh (law prof at UCLA and namesake of the Volokh Conspiracy blog) or Glenn Reynolds (aka Instapundit and U TN law prof).
Stephen Halbrook would be great, too.
June 27th, 2018 at 7:14 pm
I followed Heller and MacDonald closely. Kennedy was the most pro pure RKBA of all. Not only hunting, not only militia, but people being able to defend themselves. More so than Scalia, who straight out said that there is no right to RKBA “in the marketplace”.
June 27th, 2018 at 8:12 pm
Whoever he nominates will be Literally Hitler (C)
June 27th, 2018 at 9:07 pm
And NOW it’s going to get interesting…LOL
June 27th, 2018 at 9:16 pm
If Mich does a nuclear option, it may happen before midterms.
June 27th, 2018 at 9:44 pm
When will Ruth Bader Ginsberg retire?
She is one of the worst SCOTUS appointments ever and she should be just about due to either hang ’em up or cash in for the long dirt nap.
Problem is, Kennedy was appointed as a conservative.
I guess the lesson there is that no lawyer can be trusted on matters of truth, law or principle at any time. Earl Warren is the poster boy for that concept and Kennedy’s template for how to be after that lifetime appointment is in hand.
June 27th, 2018 at 9:52 pm
Not only the 2nd Amendment, but the 10th Amendment applies to the RKBA. That’s because without enumerated delegated powers the fedgov may do NOTHING. And there is NO enumerated delegated power in the Constitution pertaining to the People. The fedgov only has delegated power for governing such part of the militia (armed citizenry) which it calls into service and EMPLOYS. (Article I, Section 8.16).
Trump should nominate someone who can read English grammatically, in context and then obey the Law accordingly. Judges are NOT independent, but “bound by the law” (Article VI, Section 2)
June 28th, 2018 at 9:40 am
The RKBA is gonna be fine. The Supreme Court is going to be presented with an opportunity to review Roe v Wade, and that is what Leftists are scared about. One cannot have emanations of penumbras of unenumerated privacy rights that are more strictly interpreted by courts than the 2nd, in any sane world.
So Roe will be struck down as unconstitutional legislation by the Court, and Congress will need to address the abortion issue, which they should have done in 1972 and every year since. Instead of using it as a campaign funding and get-out-the-vote hobby horse to ride all the time, they’ll have to legislate and vote. The event will be amusing, to say the least, as spines made of wet spaghetti noodles try to stand upright on both sides of the aisle.
And it is a safe bet that something close to the original Roe v Wade decision will come out of the legislative process – despite all the blather over the past decades – abortion allowed up to 5 or 6 months, beyond which only for the health of the mother. The Court actually did pretty good legislating from the bench, despite the horrible fact that it quite wrongly legislated from the bench.
And then one can look at an enumerated right like the 2nd and demand the Court respect it.
June 28th, 2018 at 10:27 am
Can’t take Lee out of the Senate. On thin ice there now.
Even ignoring his disappointing performance as AG taking Sessions out was also a huge mistake.
There is a woman on the list in the Chicago district (7th) that’s been real good on guns.
June 28th, 2018 at 12:52 pm
@Scott in AZ,
You’re very correct about Mike Lee and Jeff Sessions. I just heard Mike Lee on a radio interview mention his brother who is a judge on the Utah Supreme Court, probably a better choice of the two for Trump.
Too bad he’s not younger or Judge Andrew Napolitano would be a great choice. He certainly understands the true meaning of the 2nd Amendment:
“The historical reality of the Second Amendment’s protection of the right to keep and bear arms is not that it protects the right to shoot deer. It protects the right to shoot tyrants, and it protects the right to shoot at them effectively, with the same instruments they would use upon us.”
I can still recall that Democrat classical liberals like JFK, had that same view.
June 28th, 2018 at 8:24 pm
The GOP is aiming to extend this until just past the Mid-Terms in November. Remember Charles Grassley said just a few short weeks ago that, “Kennedy needs to retire this summer so we can gin up support for the mid-terms.”
So that means the nominee will come late this summer (or October) and be someone that will excite Republicans enough to get out the vote. So no squishes this time around.
Like Old NFO said, it’s gonna get interesting. I personally expect leftist violence in the name of unborn babies, that umm…are losing their right to be killed. Or something.
June 29th, 2018 at 1:23 am
The oly thing wrong with this plan is all the 4-4 declinations of cert for otherwise good cases that will occur in the meantime.