When asked about President Joe Biden’s proposed reforms to the Supreme Court in response to rulings that his party disagrees with, Justice Neil Gorsuch of the Supreme Court delivered a stark reminder to be cautious about what you wish for.
Gorsuch spoke with Shannon Bream, the host of Fox News Sunday, and she brought up Biden’s plan to restructure the Supreme Court.
“This is not a bubble that you are in at the courts. According to Bream, “Events are taking place in the real world.” The vice president, who appears to be the Democratic nominee, has backed the court modifications that the president has suggested. What is the court’s opinion of these possible modifications?
“You won’t be surprised, Shannon, that in a year with a presidential election, I won’t be discussing a topic that is now political. That wouldn’t be helpful, in my opinion,” Gorsuch retorted.
“I’d like to add one more thing: what does an independent judiciary mean to you as an American?” It implies that you may have a fair trial under the law and the Constitution even if you’re unpopular,” he stated. “You’re popular if you’re in the majority; you don’t need juries and judges to hear you and defend your rights.”
It’s there for the times when you’re in the news and the government is after you. And you want a jury of your peers and a fiercely independent judge to make those judgments, don’t you? That’s right for you as an American, isn’t it? Gorsuch carried on. I’ll merely advise you to exercise caution.
A constitutional amendment that “would make plain that there is no protection for crimes a former president committed while in office” is one of the modifications that Biden requested. A second recommendation from a man who served for over fifty years on the Supreme Court was to restrict the tenure of the judges to eighteen years so that presidents would have to propose a new justice every two years. The court’s code of ethics, which mandates that justices “disclose gifts, refrain from any public political action, and disqualify themselves from legal cases in which they or their significant others have financial or other conflicts of interest,” was the third modification.
While promoting his recently published book, “Over Ruled: The Human Toll of Too Much Law,” Gorsuch told Shannon that although “we need laws to keep us free and safe,” having too many has led to situations in which people are breaking the law unintentionally.
“Having served as a judge for eighteen years, I have seen case after case where regular Americans were trying to go about their lives, not injure anyone, raise their kids, and they were simply getting hammered by legislation without warning,” the judge stated.
