Justice Thomas urges U.S. Supreme Court to feel free to reverse precedents

[quote] “When faced with a demonstrably erroneous precedent, my rule is simple: We should not follow it,” wrote Thomas

Without taking a position on individual cases, there is nothing wrong with that position. If the precedent is viewed as erroneous by the justices, they have an obligation to overturn it or create a new non-erroneous precedent. Dred Scott and Plessy v. Ferguson, were both erroneous precedents that were later correctly overturned.

“When faced with a demonstrably erroneous president, my rule is simple: We should not follow it,”

Buffoon.

allow me to translate: if someone or some corporation/lobby group wants to pay you a shit ton of money, feel free to follow their will and not your own or the existing law. Our president follows this mandate and we should too. (that house isn't going to buy itself you know)

How about Loving vs. Virginia, Clarence?

In other words. "We've lost in the past so we're going to change the rules." Mitch McConnell agrees. Liars, grifters, cheats, and traitors.

If the SC didn't reverse bad decisions, we would still have Plessy v. Ferguson and Bowers v. Hardwick.

Why are you idiots arguing to reverse gay rights?

The kind folks have included a picture with the definition of the Peter Principle.

Like a broken clock, the right wing people are correct sometimes: there are times when jobs shouldn't be awarded solely based on race.

Thurgood Marshall is not only rolling over in his grave, but have so many spasms that the folks around Arlington National Cemetery have reported numerous earthquakes over the years.

No decision is permanent

True, R7, but what Thomas is talking about is throwing out the concept of "stare decisis," which is the one thing keeping the court from being overly politicized. And he's talking about some longstanding precedents that he wants to go after that are a century old and that were absolutely not "demonstrably erroneous."

This is code for an "originalist" to demolish a century or more of jurisprudence, taking a wrecking ball to our judicial system and turning the court into nothing more than a rabid rightwing's dream. This has the potential to destroy the Supreme Court if it's taken to its logical conclusions.

So Thomas is no longer a conservative and believes in "activist judges" now that it is convenient.

Yes, conservatives are clamoring for the Republican appointees to seize this opportunity to remake the nation into the country they have fought for over many decades

All precedents aren't great just because they are precedent. R8 If the court felt that they had to always follow precedent we wouldn't have Gay Rights as Bowers v. Hardwick and Baker v. Nelson would still be precedent.

The only reason people are up in arms about this, is Roe V Wade, which is nowhere near a century old, R11. And, has been criticized from the beginning, even by liberal scholars as very shakily decided.

R12, that's always been the case. The most "activist" justice of the past few decades was Scalia, so it's not too surprising that Thomas is picking up that mantle.

Justice Mugabe

[quote]The only reason people are up in arms about this, is Roe V Wade, which is nowhere near a century old, [R11].

Had I meant Roe v. Wade, I'd have said Roe v. Wade, R14. And it's far more than Roe v. Wade that is at stake here, as they really are going after century-old precedent.

When you can’t win the game on skill, you work the refs.

R17 List which ones you think he is going after, then. All articles I have seen about this goes on about Roe.

R14, to be more specific, look up the Lochner v. New York decision, decided in 1905. This is the world that the right-wing wants to return us to.

Justice Stevens would agree,

[quote]District of Columbia v. Heller, which recognized an individual right to possess a firearm under the Constitution, is unquestionably the most clearly incorrect decision that the Supreme Court announced during my tenure on the bench. The text of the Second Amendment unambiguously explains its purpose: “A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”

And, of course, once you take out Roe, then you'll take out Griswold v. Connecticut, not to mention every pro-gay ruling of the past 50 years, including Lawrence v. Texas.

Brown vs. board of education, also R22. They want to destroy everything

[quote]If the court felt that they had to always follow precedent we wouldn't have Gay Rights as Bowers v. Hardwick and Baker v. Nelson would still be precedent.

You're missing the point. The Supreme Court, for the most part, has been very cautious in how it approaches precedent, not just randomly and arbitrarily overturning long-established precedent. The Roberts Court has exhibited no such restraint, and definitely not only in cases that are "demonstrably erroneous."

If the Court is allowed to become overly-partisan, throwing out precedent, upending a century or more of jurisprudence, that has the potential to destroy its authority. And it's a door that, once opened, cannot be closed again.

There's nothing inherently sacred about precedent, one just needs to be very conservative and cognizant of how if you can do it then others can as well

R22 You are wrong, for one thing Griswold was decided well before Roe. You are making the same argument that right wing people did in saying that if gay marriage was allowed it would lead to beastility, etc... You can get rid of Roe without invalidating the others.

R20 I doubt the court would return to that position, as it has been condemned by scholars left, right and center.

R24 But that isn't what he said, he said only precedents that are demonstrably erroneous. The problem is that both sides of the political spectrum have increasingly turned to the court to win what they can't win at the ballot box, which makes those wins less powerful.

R26: Overturning Griswold is the ultimate goal. They want the Right to Privacy eliminated. You're a damn fool if you don't see that.

And they are ABSOLUTELY going to try to go back to the Lochner Era, as much as they can. Again, you're a damn fool if you can't see that they've been arguing for such for 40 years.

Justice William J. Brennan is quoted as saying of the nation's highest court: "If you have five votes here, you can do anything." Precedent that was established in that way on the whim of five justices and not based on the Constitution or statute is suitable for reversing. Precedent that has a solid foundation is safe.

R27 I'm R26 and I'm also a Political Scientist.

No, R26, you can't. Roe v. Wade was decided on the right to privacy. To take out Roe, you have to take out that right. And if there is no right to privacy, then you're taking out Griswold v. Connecticut and just about every pro-gay ruling.

Lochner is absolutely the target of the right-wing and of libertarians because the ruling that struck it down "infringed on economic freedom." See, for example, the link to the Koch Institute.

As for what he "said," why are you bothering with that? Don't look at what he said; look at what he did. That precedent I linked to that the right-wing majority overturned does not fit his words. When words and deeds conflict, look for the deeds.

R28: The court is bound by public opinion, for it can only rely on its prestige and reputation to carry out it's rulings. There are limits to how far it will go, unless 5 members have said fuck it, damn the consequences. That hasn't happened...yet.

Apparently not one who has studied the courts, R29. Maybe you should do a little more homework?

That's precisely what Thomas is saying, though, R31, which is why quite a few people are concerned, and not just because of Roe v. Wade.

R32: I will be fair to R29 here and state that it's not just the courts, it's the political regime and the ideology of the President who appoints the Justices. Were you go wrong R29, is that you are too charitable to the 4 justices on the court who are all firmly in the New Right Reganite regime. Roberts is as well but he values the independence and the prestige of the court I mentioned up in R31. He will be a brake on decisions that the public just will not support. Nonetheless. the Reaganite regime is clear, they are against Griswold and in favor of Lochner or a reasonable facsimile thereof.

Keep in mind, too, that this isn't the first case where Thomas is telling the court to throw out precedent. This is a pattern with Thomas.

The Lochner era revival. And it's not just from Thomas.

R32 I have studied the courts, though it is not my main focus. The difference is that I am overall slightly center-right with a libertarian bent, and I suspect you aren't.

Your bent and mine, R37, have nothing at all to do with the jurisprudence of the Roberts Court, the precedents they have overturned, and the meaning behind Thomas's words.

Nor does your bent or mine have anything to with the fact that the right to privacy established by Griswold v. Connecticut is the underpinning of Roe v. Wade and quite a few other court decisions.

Nor does your bent or mine have anything to do with the court's willingness to revisit, and overturn, centuries-old jurisprudence that was emphatically not "demonstrably erroneous."

Overturn Roe v Wade. Abortion should not be used to get rid of a baby you don't want.

R38 It has everything to do with how we view what they are doing. You obviously view anything coming from the right or libertarians as evil, I do not.

I do believe that you can overturn the later Roe decision, without overturning the right to privacy from the earlier Griswold decision, for two reasons. 1) Roe was NOT decided directly on the precedent of Griswold but upon a line of precedents going back to Union Pacific Railroad V Botsford in 1891. 2) When you overturn precedence you don't invalidate the precedents that came before it, only the ones after, and then only those cases that were directly decided based on the precedence.

The sooner this Republican trash dies, the better off we’ll all be.

[quote] You obviously view anything coming from the right or libertarians as evil, I do not.

Making shit up is *really* not helping your case. You cannot defend this statement or find anything in my comments that even remotely indicates this.

I'm sorry but you're simply wrong about Roe. The right to privacy absolutely was the underpinning of Roe. And if you decide that you do not have a right to privacy in Roe, that undermines every single case that depends on the right to privacy, including Griswold and every major gay case.

Do they immediately get invalidated? Of course not. New cases get adjudicated, make their way to the Supreme Court, and they are overturned at that time, one by one.

Just stop. You simply have no idea what you're talking about, you're completely ignoring the precedents they've already overturned, you're ignoring the return to the Lochner era documente above, you're ignoring everything mentioned here because it undermines the point you are trying to make, a point that you cannot defend.

Just for the record, r40, are you really not aware that Union Pacific v. Botsford was essentially a right to privacy case?

R42 Yes Roe, was adjudicated on Privacy, though my opinion is that it shouldn't have been. I fully believe in a constitutional right to privacy, but that it does not extend to abortion.

R43 Yes I am aware, and that was my point. The right to privacy has a much longer record of precedence than just Roe or Griswold.

Um, R44, that there is a longer line of jurisprudence about privacy than just Griswold v. Connecticut is not being contested here. To overturn Roe, you have to overturn that jurisprudence, being willing to throw out a century of precedent in doing so, which is exactly what we have claimed and you have tried to deny. And if you decide that there is no such right to privacy, then everything else I and others have written in this thread is indeed correct and other decisions will be readjudicated.

In other words, you are summarizing precisely the point we have been making.

Not to mention that, in your fixation with Roe v. Wade, you have completely ignored all of the other points raised that demonstrate the Roberts Court, and Justice Thomas's, willingness to overturn precedent that can in no way be described as "demonstrably erroneous."

Justice Thomas is after Trump of course perhaps the biggest chowderhead ever to rise to such a responsible position. He is simply the biggest turd in America's punchbowl I can ever imagine!

I hope he keels over dead the second a Democrat is next elected President.

[quote]No decision is permanent

R10 is spot on. But it would be more correct to state "No decision can or should be permanent in a democracy".

R45 NO YOU DON"T. There is a big leap from saying that woman don't have the right to privacy concerning abortions to saying their is no privacy concerning contraceptives,

R46 The Robert's court has overturned precedents at a lower rate than any of three previous courts. This article is from last year, but the rate hasn't really changed.

Twitter says Thomas didn't write this opinion; he's just not that smart. His Koch-funded clerks did.

As a Canadian I can tell you that Clarence Thomas is the worst justice on your Supreme Court. Not a friend of minorities even though he's one himself, and next to useless. This mindless old fart needs to go NOW!!

I am not an American so please excuse my ignorance, but why do you have laws in the first place if they can just be overturned by this Supreme Court? Why does it have so much power? In Canada, if we don’t want to listen to the Supreme Court, we don’t. For example, abortion. If we want restrictions on abortion, then we make a law with restrictions on abortion. If we change your mind later on, we change the law.

Clarence, they could always bring back slavery. All the repug justices would love to and would vote to do it

The only ones who would be against would be Ginsberg and Sotomayor

R51 do you understand their government? I don’t.

[quote]I am not an American so please excuse my ignorance, but why do you have laws in the first place if they can just be overturned by this Supreme Court?

The Supreme Court is the last stop for all laws enacted in the US. In the traditional setup (i.e. what we don't have right now), Congress drafts the laws, President signs them, and the Court can rule on whether they stand based on legal precedent.

The Supreme Court is the last stand for legal cases in the US. What they say goes. What Thomas is trying to provoke here is extremely reckless, and flies in the face of 800 years of legal opinion.

R55 It sounds like The US Supreme Court is The root of all the problems you guys are having. There’s always a threat of a law being overturned if the wrong party is in power. Sounds very counterproductive.

R56, it's not supposed to be that way. Theoretically, the judicial branch should be non-partisan and independent. However, over the last 40 years especially, there has been a concerted effort, mostly by Republicans, to create a court that is purely partisan.

how long must we endure this turd?

[quote][R55] It sounds like The US Supreme Court is The root of all the problems you guys are having. There’s always a threat of a law being overturned if the wrong party is in power. Sounds very counterproductive.

Two US presidents gave us four Supreme Court justices - GW Bush and Trump. Both of whom lost the popular vote.

It's the conservative minority gaming the system to leverage way the fuck too much power.

The biggest part of the story that just came out was that Thomas cited Obergefell v. Hodges - the case that brought marriage equality to the entire nation. I hate that man.

Of course

This is going to become irreversible when Breyer and Ginsberg die or retire.

They won't be replaced by moderates.

unless 5 members have said fuck it, damn the consequences. That hasn't happened...yet.

—TheWeatherFairy reply 31

Thomas just became the first of five to say it.

Yup, Thomas explicitly cited Obergefell as one of those cases as a "demonstrably erroneous precedent," which is total bullshit.

[quote]“I write separately to address the proper role of the doctrine of stare decisis,” Thomas said in his opinion. “In my view, the Court’s typical formulation of the stare decisis standard does not comport with our judicial duty under Article III because it elevates demonstrably erroneous decisions—meaning decisions outside the realm of permissible interpretation—over the text of the Constitution and other duly enacted federal law.”

[quote]Then Thomas cites Chief Justice Roberts’ dissent in Obergefell to drive home his point.

[quote]“It is always ‘tempting for judges to confuse our own preferences with the requirements of the law,’ Obergefell v. Hodges,” cited Thomas, “and the Court’s stare decisis doctrine exacerbates that temptation by giving the venire of respectability to our continued application of demonstrably incorrect precedents.”

So the idiot above who insisted that this would only impact Roe v. Wade is full of shit.

[quote]What Thomas is trying to provoke here is extremely reckless, and flies in the face of 800 years of legal opinion.

And it undermines the authority of the court, should the rest of his fellow conservatives follow along. They'll get their conservative utopia, the complete remaking of U.S. jurisprudence, but at the cost of destroying the court's credibility. Pandora's box, once opened, cannot be closed.

[quote]R55 It sounds like The US Supreme Court is The root of all the problems you guys are having. There’s always a threat of a law being overturned if the wrong party is in power.

Wrong on both counts. The problem we are talking about is the thread of a rogue court, not any specific ruling. And the court, until fairly recently, has been above this whole "threat of a law being overturned if the wrong party is in power" nonsense.

Yes, they did occasionally stray to the partisan side but the court, on the whole, has been able to remain above it all and maintain its authority in the process. If the court were to abandon that, that has enormous consequences for the court and for the country.

[quote]NO YOU DON"T.

YES YOU DO. I have no idea why you think that all caps makes your case any more compelling.

[quote]There is a big leap from saying that woman don't have the right to privacy concerning abortions to saying their is no privacy concerning contraceptives,

NO THERE ISN'T. Either there is an explicit right to privacy or there is not. If there is not, and you would need to rule that way to overturn Roe v. Wade, then every other ruling that depends on that right goes on the chopping block. And, as noted above, Thomas is explicitly calling out Obergefell, so your assertion that this only affects Roe v. Wade is false on its face.

[quote]R46 The Robert's court has overturned precedents at a lower rate than any of three previous courts. This article is from last year, but the rate hasn't really changed.

You're going to have to back that up with a citation. In any case, it's not the number; it's the scope and extent of the willingness to overturn precedent, particularly precedent that is not "demonstrably erroneous." As Breyer noted in his dissent, the "decision can only cause one to wonder which cases the Court will overrule next."

R49: Reason is a biased, non-academic, non-peer reviewed source. Automatically ignored. I wouldn't let my undergrads cite that in a paper.

R52: The Supreme Court of Canada has the same power to declare laws null and void due to violating the Constitution as ours does. The one difference is that Pierre Trudeau compromised with right wing provincial governments in 1982 when they were drawing up the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and repatriating the Constitution from Britain with The Notwithstanding Clause, which allows federal and provincial governments to ignore Court rulings by a vote of Parliament or Provincial Legislature. That "ignore" function must be renewed every five years.

Quebec has been using it since your Supreme Court declared the Provincial Language Law, Bill 101, as unconstitutional back in the 80!

If we won both the senate and the house, we could impeach judges. It's a fantasy, I realize, but it's my dream.

One other thing worth noting is that this wasn't just an offhand comment from Thomas, it wasn't in response to an interview question, it wasn't from a private or public conversation: he's been writing this, more than once, into his official Supreme Court opinions.

It's also worth noting that he doesn't need to say this, because it's well understood. Everyone knows that the Supreme Court will overturn egregiously awful former opinions. Every lawyer, every federal judge, etc. knows this.

So why did he say this? And repeat it? What message is he sending?

Those of you who imply that Clarence Thomas intends to advance the cause of Civil Rights progress by over-riding rulings of previous Courts, are NUTS.

As citizens, we need to stop pretending that the Supreme Court is the final arbiter of legal issues. The Constitution provides the check on the SC by allowing any decision to be overturned by a constitutional amendment. It's insane that pro-choice people have spent the last 45 years trying to protect a court decision instead of investing all the time and effort on passing an abortion amendment. The only reason Roe v. Wade is ever threatened is because it's based on incredibly shaky legal reasoning. An amendment, if that is what the American people actually want, would decide the issue permanently.

R71: Cracker please. You need 2/3rds of both Chambers of Congress and then 38 state legislatures to pass an amendment. With gerrymandering and the distribution of voters, not to mention the "personal" fee fees of lawmakers voting on an amendment, it's completely impossible to do. Frankly, the first 2 things in my list are the reason most of the left wing policy the vast majority of Americans support has not been, and will be very difficult to, enact into law.

I agree the Courts are not the end all, be all, and their decisions can be ignored. Though once you start down the path of ignoring the courts, forever will it dominate our political destiny. We'll never be able to turn to them again for redress.

Black conservatives are the WORST.

Gorsuch also endorsed the notion of disregarding bad percent last week

Precedent

Fat Clarence is married to fat Ginni, who makes a million bucks a year for lobbying on behalf of hard-right wing-nut causes. Which they conveniently "forgot" to declare. That is why Clarence wants to turn all the laws back to 1910.

I’m sure Clarence the Clown means Marbury v Madison.

Maybe "Mr. Tight Lips" will be talking about this soon =

Let's start with lifetime appointments of SC justices.

Amen R79.

It’s obvious that the American elite have decided that the only way to compete with China, is to turn America into a shit hole of a country. How else will they be able to hold on to their wealth?

It’s incomprehensible to me how day on, day out, night after night, millions of Americans sit in front of their televisions, voluntarily consuming fear & lies, steadily fed to them via FOX “News”. They blindly follow directions, casting their votes every 2 to 4 years, in order to help some of the most unethical, malignant narcissists who have ever lived, just so that these men and women can remain billionaires.

They never, ever question why it is that men who care nothing about out veterans, our poor, or out infrastructure, spend millions upon millions regarding the erosion of abortion laws. Hint: their concern has ZERO to do with unborn babies, and everything to do with erosion of privacy laws, in order to deregulate things that you never noticed kept you safe, because you’re indeed, safe.

What is it that drives the regular, average Joe, to fall for this stuff? Why can they not see that they support people who only want MORE MONEY & POWER, which means that the lives of average Americans MUST deteriorate in every way possible in order for their goals to be sustainable?

I welcome anyone here to take a number of free Micro and Macro Economic courses online if they have any doubt that this is not the case.

In order for the very few to remain wealthy, they must take away from you systematically, and on intervals where more is taken from you, simply because there are more of you, then there are of them. There are hundreds of ways for them to do this, but it all begins and ends at the ballot boxes.

Please, try to understand why you vote the way you vote, and just who are the people behind the men and women who you vote into office.

Bump

Does that mean a return to legislated racism?

Eugenics, anyone?