What Next - The Supreme Court Needs an Upgrade
Slate News
Slate Podcasts
4.5 • 6K Ratings
🗓️ 6 July 2022
⏱️ 27 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The Supreme Court treated its most recent term like the opening salvo in a conservative revolution, approving prayer in schools, establishing a constitutional right to conceal and carry a firearm, and eliminating the constitutional right to abortion. What options do President Biden and Congress have to check the power of this co-equal branch of government?
Guest: Mark Joseph Stern, Slate senior writer.
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Transcript
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| 0:36.4 | I like having Slates Mark Joseph Stern on the show because he manages to have a sense of humor |
| 0:41.9 | about the Supreme Court. I laugh so as to not cry. You know, it's pretty brutal at the court these days. |
| 0:52.9 | Mark laughs even as he acknowledges that the court's jurisprudence this term |
| 0:59.5 | amounted to a bloodbath for progressives. And Mark is a progressive. There was the abortion |
| 1:05.4 | ruling, of course, but then this long line of other decisions. I mean, how much time do we have here? |
| 1:12.4 | For gun owners, the court established a constitutional right to conceal to carry. The justice is |
| 1:17.9 | okayed prayer on a school football field. And they ruled that even if a prisoner has proven their |
| 1:23.6 | innocence, they may have to stay behind bars. Anyway, but it's not just the rulings themselves |
| 1:30.4 | that upset Mark. It's the strange split screen between the court and its co-equal branch of |
| 1:35.7 | government across the street. Congress. These institutions, they're supposed to balance each other out, |
| 1:42.1 | but there's a problem with that. As we all know, Congress can barely do anything. A 50-50 senate, |
| 1:49.8 | especially as hampering any major legislation, but the Supreme Court can just act as soon as five |
| 1:57.0 | justices decide they're ready to do it. And there's no check on their authority. I mean, they |
| 2:01.6 | just get it done in a way that Congress cannot imagine. Like, Congress could never. |
| 2:06.1 | For Mark, the last day of this year's session, it was the hardest stomach. It started with the court |
| 2:12.4 | restricting the environmental protection agencies, ability to regulate greenhouse gases. And then, |
... |
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