General Discussion

Celerity

(43,333 posts) Fri Mar 11, 2022, 06:05 PM Mar 2022

The Supreme Court signals it may empower state legislatures to subvert elections

Republicans are pushing the independent state legislature doctrine, which would bolster unfettered gerrymandering and Trump’s efforts to undercut democracy.

https://boltsmag.org/independent-state-legislature-doctrine/

The U.S. Supreme Court signaled on Monday that at least four justices are ready and willitheirng to bless a legal theory that was never really taken seriously until the 2020 elections. The so-called independent state legislature doctrine, if adopted, would provide new legal cover for Republicans to use their vast powers in states to subvert elections, shield aggressive gerrymanders, and restrict access to the vote in Democratic strongholds at the local level.

Their feverish idea is that state legislatures should have complete and unfettered control over how federal elections are run and regulated, shielded even from the oversight of state courts. Against the backdrop of efforts by President Donald Trump’s supporters to reverse the last presidential election and prepare for the next one, the doctrine would give carte blanche to Republican-run legislatures in swing states like Georgia and Wisconsin, which the GOP has gerrymandered, to ensure it never loses.

In 2020, Texas and other Republican-led states implored the Supreme Court to block certification of the presidential election results in key states like Pennsylvania that Joe Biden won. They claimed that those states had flouted the Constitution and past legal precedents purportedly making it clear that “a single branch of State government”—that is, the state legislature—has the authority to set the rules governing the appointment of presidential electors. Because “executive and judicial officials made significant changes to the legislatively defined election laws in the Defendant States,” Texas insisted, these states had violated the Constitution’s Electors Clause and Elections Clause.

As Texas and its allied states see things, these clauses teach that only a state’s legislature may establish or modify the rules governing who elects the president and other federal offices. All other state “non-legislative actors,” like courts or election administrators, must abide by those rules. The Supreme Court rejected their plea at the time without opining on the merits. Weeks later, the Jan. 6 insurrection on the Capitol attempted by brute force what the justices wouldn’t do through the force of law.

snip