Nowhere in the Constitution does it say that we have to have nine Supreme Court justices. Nor would it require a Constitutional amendment to add more seats. In fact, Congress has expanded the Supreme Court five times throughout American history.
Congress should use its constitutional authority to rebalance the Supreme Court, which has been taken over by a supermajority that holds extreme views outside of the mainstream of legal thought and out of step with most Americans. That’s why Congress must pass the Judiciary Act, which would add four seats to the Supreme Court and help stem the right-wing supermajority’s attacks on our fundamental freedoms, including the right to access abortion care.
There’s nothing stopping Congress from adding justices—except for the political will to do it, of course. In fact, recent polling showed that the majority of American voters support expanding the court. That’s why I’m urging Congress to pass the Judiciary Act of 2021 and add four seats to the Supreme Court.
Alicia Morin
Atascadero
This article appears in Jun 30 – Jul 10, 2022.
While this might provide momentary political advantage, Democrats would come to regret it the next time political power shifted, and Republicans added, say, 8 more seats, and used the new majority to jam painful polcies down the throats of the Democratic minority. Recall that Democrat Harry Reid used the “nuclear option” to get some of Obama’s appointees confirmed, and it ultimately resulted in Trump getting his 3 nominees confirmed. I know you kids all have short attention spans, and tend to act impulsively, but this is something you might want to think through.
It would be far better to bring other cases forward that will give the Justices the opportunity to correct their mistakes.
Cases pose a question so the question posed becomes the single most important sentence in any court case.
Cases asking the right question is how to protect our Right to Privacy.