Weekend Open Thread

11 thoughts on “Weekend Open Thread”

1. Mornin' whilst it's still mornin'! Our old buddy Douglas Bruce has filed as registered agent for a committee to oppose Prop HH, for what that's worth. Otherwise I got nothing!

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   1. Doug Bruce is still with us? (Well, only the good die young.)

      BTW, former Conservative Senator James Buckley – and brother of William F. – died yesterday at the age of 100. 

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   2. Thanks, Jung one. Welp, that seals it for me; I’ll definitely be voting for HH.

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2. In honor of Halloween (shopping season) now in full swing . . .

   

   . . . And, this reminder:  GOPers, get your little grabbed-pussy costume now before they're all snatched up!

    

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   1. If only TFG really were a witch- a healer, in touch with the earth and the seasons, a sculptor of intent and a maker of change. Alas, no…the modern  “witch hunt” usually nets  a green-skinned caricature holding a plastic cauldron of candy.

      As far as the “grabbed-pussy costume” , by now I’m sure it’s your intent to offend, in this case by mocking victims of TFG’s sexual assaults. Mission accomplished.

      You’ve gotten your juvenile ya-ya points for today. I guess you showed “them” how brave and unconventional you are. 

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      1. Thanks,Tree; you’re a real birch.

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         1. Awwww. So kind of you to notice.

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3. Employ the 14th Amendment Heather Cox-Richardson.

   Various constitutional lawyers have been weighing in lately on whether former president Donald Trump and others who participated in the effort to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election are disqualified from holding office under the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution. The third section of that amendment, ratified in 1868, reads: 

   “No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.”

   On August 14 an article forthcoming from the University of Pennsylvania Law Review by William Baude of the University of Chicago Law School and Michael S. Paulsen of the University of St. Thomas School of Law became available as a preprint. It argued that the third section of the Fourteenth Amendment is still in effect (countering arguments that it applied only to the Civil War era secessionists), that it is self-executing (meaning the disqualification of certain people is automatic, much as age limits or residency requirements are), and that Trump and others who participated in trying to steal the 2020 presidential election are disqualified from holding office.

   This paper was a big deal because while liberal thinkers have been making this argument for a while now, Baude and Paulsen are associated with the legal doctrine of originalism, an approach to the law that insists the Constitution should be understood as those who wrote its different parts understood them.

   …

   And that’s where the Fourteenth Amendment came in. When Johnson tried to restore the former Confederates to power after the Civil War, Americans wrote into the Constitution that anyone born or naturalized in the U.S. was a citizen, and then they established that states must treat all citizens equally before the law, thus taking away the legal basis for the Black Codes and giving the federal government power to enforce equality in the states. They also made sure that anyone who rebels against the federal government can’t make or enforce the nation’s laws. 

   Republicans in the 1860s would certainly have believed the Fourteenth Amendment covered Trump’s attempt to overturn the results of a presidential election. More, though, that amendment sought to establish, once and for all, the supremacy of the federal government over those who wanted to solidify their power in the states, where they could impose the will of a minority. That concept speaks directly to today’s Republicans.

   In The Atlantic today, two prominent legal scholars from opposite sides of the political spectrum, former federal judge J. Michael Luttig and emeritus professor of constitutional law at Harvard Law School Laurence H. Tribe, applauded the Baude-Paulsen article and suggested that the American people should support the “faithful application and enforcement of their Constitution.” 

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   1. A recent Washington Post guest opinion treads over the same general ground:

      These scholars explain in a forthcoming law review article that the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol was an insurrection within the meaning of this clause and, crucially, that Trump engaged in this insurrection within the clause’s meaning, by both fomenting it and failing to exercise his presidential powers to stop it once it was underway.

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      1. Foley is a chaired constitutional law professor and an election law expert.  His analysis, and those of the other professors and Judge Luttig, are solid.  But without states or Congress taking action, they'll sadly just be great reads.  

          

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         1. As for the states taking action, this is all well, good and fine but ….

            The elections officer of each state would be entitled to make a determination. In some states, such as CA, NY, MA, IL, and probably even CO, the secretaries of state might rule F.D.F.Q. was unqualified and refuse to place him on the ballot. But F.D.F.Q. was probably not going to win any of those states anyway.

            Other states, such as FL, TX, AL, MS and SC, would not only place F.D.F.Q. on the ballot but they would probably prevent Biden from being listed.  Of those states, TX is probably the only one which Biden has even a long-shot chance of winning.

            Question:  who is the chief elections officer in the 8 states that matter:  WI, MI, PA, GA, AZ, NV, NC and NH? 

            Besides, after the states start going in different directions on this, it ends up before SCOTUS which issues a 5+1 to 3 (Roberts, C.J. concurring with the majority) holding that the insurrection ban in the constitution doesn't apply to Donnie. 

             

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