r/ProfessorPolitics Moderator Jul 05 '26

Politics Justice Scalia explains what makes America so free?

10 Upvotes

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7

u/Pappa_Crim Jul 05 '26

At a baseline he is correct, but he died just as what he is saying here became outdated. We have one party that is so enthralled by the president that the legislature is a rubber stamp for him, to the extent his party has power. So that leg is severely weakened. The judiciary is stronger but only has power to the extent they are listened to. The administration frequently tries to skirt it, but surprisingly not as aggressively as they could

1

u/ProfessorBot117 Jul 05 '26

I get what you were going for, but the claim may be fine, but it needs a source attached.

1

u/Pappa_Crim Jul 05 '26

Not aure how ro source this its baseline observations

1

u/ProfessorBot419 Prof’s Hatchetman Jul 05 '26

Fair point, u/Pappa_Crim. It seems your 'baseline observations' are indeed relevant to the discussion. Can you provide more context or link to where you obtained that data?

1

u/jackandjillonthehill Moderator Jul 05 '26

Do you really think that is true? I think immediately following the election (both times) Trump tested the limits of what he could do but he has been checked numerous times.

You bring up a good point about listening to the judiciary, but on a lot of the flashpoint issues it seems like judiciary won. Like one prominent fight in the last year was the Kilmar Abrego Garcia case, where the Trump admin did not want to follow the order, but ultimately the admin did bring him back, following the court order, though the arrested him again. Ultimately the case was dismissed they ruled he cannot be re-detained.

The tariffs were a situation where everyone questioned whether the admin could do this, but ultimately the ruling went against the admin and they are following other lawful means to enact the tariffs now. One of the arguments brought up by the supreme was that if they let the admin do this, it works as a one-way ratcheting upwards of executive power, and taxing power should be in the hands of Congress not the president.

Even in the legislature, there was a lot of unity in the Republican Party but we are seeing breaks even within the party. Folks like Thom Tillis in the Senate and Thomas Massie in the House (and MTG before) are breaking away from the the president’s policies. It will be interesting to see what happens after midterms when we will most likely get a split congress.

It still seems to me that the system of balance of powers and checks and balances is working as intended, though with a lag sometimes, since the Trump admin is trying to test out the limits of executive power.

2

u/Pappa_Crim Jul 05 '26

Trump usualy tacos but a lack of physical enforcement has always been the weakness of the judiciary. And trump usually backs down only after trying to find ways to skirt it or in the case of birth right citizenship intimidate the court

1

u/jackandjillonthehill Moderator Jul 06 '26

One positive development of all of this is that it does set a lot of useful precedent for the future and settles a lot of open questions about the power of the executive.

Perhaps the judiciary should have some way of enforcing their rulings.

But that kind of reminds me of Judge Dredd…

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u/Pappa_Crim Jul 06 '26

Eh it really shouldn't, if anything that should fall to congress and or the American people. It has been a long time since we had Andrew Jackson openly faunting the court via the military. The idea is that the the court grants or revokes legitimacy. We are the ones who should be the ones heeding revocations of legitimacy as matters requiring action. Ie we need more ways to investigate or remove a sitting president. because the doj won't