Today President Joe Biden will announce a plan to "reform" the U.S. Supreme Court during his final six months in office.
But all it does is demonstrate that he learned nothing of how the three branches of government operate despite his half-century in office.
Following a series of high court opinions that impeded Biden’s administrative goals, he announced a plan which Politico.com described as an ideological shift for him.
In the past he’s ignored calls for court reform.
He offered a hint of what he intended to do during an address he made from the Oval Office last week.
"I'm going to call for Supreme Court reform, because this is critical to our democracy," he said. He’s expected to go into more detail today. Politico reported that, according to sources, those "reforms" would likely include:
- Term limits for Supreme Court justices;
- Establishing an ethics code for the court; and finally,
- Starting the process for a constitutional amendment limiting presidential immunity.
Others have surmised that he may call for an increase in the size of the court, so that he can change its ideological makeup.
This is called "court packing," and was attempted by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1937 when he didn’t get his way with the high court.
He failed to get his way with Congress too, when it failed to approve the Judicial Procedures Reform Bill.
But everything on Biden’s wish list should be nonstarters.
Establishing term limits for U.S. Supreme Court justices — or any federal judges — would require a constitutional amendment.
Article III, Section 1 of the U.S. Constitution provides that "Judges shall hold their position during good behavior," which means for life, or until they retire, or until they’re removed for cause following an impeachment and trial.
The other two branches — legislative (members of Congress) and executive (the president) are elected by the people and have to be reelected from time-to-time.
Accordingly, they’re referred to as political branches because they answer to the people.
Members of the federal judiciary do not and should not answer to the people — they serve only the laws and Constitution, so their lifetime appointment insulates them from public whims.
And because it would require a constitutional amendment, it would be a non-starter.
The second provision — establishing a judicial code of ethics — is at least arguably unconstitutional and therefore another non-starter.
Each of the three branches are independent of and coequal to the other two, and they therefore lack the power to set a code of ethics for another branch, which is another indication Biden has no conception of how government operates.
The third — a constitutional amendment limiting presidential immunity — has as much a chance of success as a constitutional amendment to set term limits for the court.
And that chance would be only slightly better than a snowball surviving hell.
That only leaves the one item not mentioned by Politico’s sources — court packing.
Sen. Ted Cruz told Newsmax TV that court packing was his single biggest fear.
The Texas Republican believed that if Democrats get the chance, they’ll add four more liberal justice to bring the size of the court from nine members to13 — something that even the late liberal Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg opposed.
"Nine seems to be a good number. It's been that way for a long time," she said in a 2019 interview with NPR. She added that "I think it was a bad idea when President Franklin Roosevelt tried to pack the court."
Although court packing might be the approach having the greatest possibility of success, it would still be a long-shot.
Since former President Trump changed the makeup of the court to include three conservatives, three liberals, and three swing votes, Democrats, including Biden, have denounced its landmark decisions on abortion, gun rights, and affirmative action.
But the court also delivered blows to Biden’s own ambitions, especially on vaccine mandates, student loan forgiveness, and most recently executive privilege.
That one will likely dispose of the remainder of the lawsuits directed against Trump.
With less than six months remaining in his presidency, any efforts to "reform" a court that needs no reforming are akin to a hamster in a treadwheel.
No matter how fast he runs, he’s not going to make any headway.
These months might be better spent telling his vice president to do her own job and protect the country from its invaders, rather than shuffle, and occasionally stumble along on his own treadmill.
Michael Dorstewitz is a retired lawyer and has been a frequent contributor to Newsmax. He is also a former U.S. Merchant Marine officer and an enthusiastic Second Amendment supporter. Read Michael Dorstewitz's Reports — More Here.
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