Senator Chuck Schumer doesn’t like some recent Supreme Court decisions. So, what does he do? He calls the Supreme Court names. His new nickname for the highest court in the land is “the MAGA Court.” MAGA – “Make America Great Again” – was Trump’s campaign slogan in 2016. What does it mean to call the nation’s Supreme Court “the MAGA Court”? I assume it’s intended to denigrate not only the Court’s decisions but its composition as well, as if to suggest that the Court is now illegitimate because it has supposedly become a rubber stamp for some sort of Trumpian political philosophy, if such a thing exists. It’s true that Trump, when he was president, nominated three of the Supreme Court’s nine justices. Do three members among nine determine the nature of the Court? Does one-third of the votes make a Maga Court?
Let’s look at who appointed the nine current members of “the MAGA Court.” Biden appointed one: Ketanji Brown Jackson, who was sworn in today. Trump appointed three: Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett (in that order). Obama appointed two: Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan. George W. Bush appointed two: John Roberts and Samuel Alito. Clinton appointed Stephen Breyer, who officially retired from the Court today. And George H.W. Bush appointed Clarence Thomas.
Do the math! Three current justices were appointed when Democrats occupied the White House. The other six were appointed by Republican presidents. In what way, if any, is Schumer accurate in designating the nine members of the High Court as “the MAGA Court”? Or, since it only takes the agreement of five of the nine justices to issue a majority ruling, perhaps Schumer assumes that any SC justice appointed by a Republican president must invariably be committed to Trump’s MAGA approach to issues and governance. Chief Justice Roberts and associate justices Alito and Thomas are then lumped together with the three Trump appointees, and Voilà: We have a MAGA COURT!
But regardless of how the nine are likely to vote on any given issue, should the leader of the Senate’s Democrats – or any other national political leader of either party – constantly slam our nation’s highest court, and not just a particular decision, but the Court itself? What is the likely result of Schumer’s continuing to disparage the Supreme Court and suggest that its rulings are illegitimate – as distinct from poorly decided – because of who sits on the Court? I imagine that the result is likely to be less respect for the Court, and perhaps altogether less respect for our nation’s judicial system. If we follow Schumer’s lead towards denigrating the Supreme Court as currently constituted, then we might start to ask: If the judges don’t return the decisions we think they should, what good are they?
Perhaps what lies behind Schumer’s repeated assaults on the Court is the plan that Elizabeth Warren has been so vocal about: court-packing, i.e., increasing the number of SC justices, provided, of course, that the expansion occurs when a Democrat occupies the White House. But, meanwhile, respect for the institution of the Supreme Court is likely to diminish as it is constantly attacked and its individual members are continually vilified.