Supreme Court Leaves Citizenship Question Blocked For Now From 2020 Census

[SummerMadness]

Supreme Court Leaves Citizenship Question Blocked For Now From 2020 Census

In a defeat for the Trump administration, the Supreme Court leaves the citizenship question blocked for now from the 2020 census, in part because of the government's explanation for why it added it in the first place.

The majority said it "cannot ignore the disconnect between the decision made and the explanation given" by the Trump administration.

 

[JacobKStarkey]

imo, that the admin cannot bridge the thesis to the reasons does not startle the rational mind.

I wonder, though, if this is tip off on how SCOTUS will rule on gerrymandering.

 

[iluvatar5150]

I wonder, though, if this is tip off on how SCOTUS will rule on gerrymandering.

Nope.

 

[SummerMadness]

imo, that the admin cannot bridge the thesis to the reasons does not startle the rational mind.

I wonder, though, if this is tip off on how SCOTUS will rule on gerrymandering.

They ruled in favor of allowing political gerrymandering. The only problem with this ruling is they are allowing them another shot at this despite knowing the truth. Roberts is simply telling them to make up a better lie so he can pretend it's valid.

 

[JacobKStarkey]

Give us the previous SCOTUS case, please.

 

[Ringo84]

The good news is that analysis I've seen indicate that this regime (which has shown its inability to find its hindquarters with both hands and a map) probably won't be organized or competent enough to get the question ready before the census forms have to be printed in October.

Lower courts seem upset because of the obvious racial bias behind the question, and also seem poised to address it. So there probably won't be a discriminatory question on the next census questionnaire.

The bad news is that analysis I've seen has also indicated that Roberts' main argument was "We can't accept this because you lied to me (wink wink). I'll remand this for now so you can try again (wink wink nudge GOP lawyers with elbow).

The gerrymandering decision, though, is another in a series of horrible SCOTUS decisions - Citizens United, gutting the VRA, and Bush v. Gore.

Democrats need to pack the courts.
Ringo

 

[SimplyMe]

The good news is that analysis I've seen indicate that this regime (which has shown its inability to find its hindquarters with both hands and a map) probably won't be organized or competent enough to get the question ready before the census forms have to be printed in October.

Lower courts seem upset because of the obvious racial bias behind the question, and also seem poised to address it. So there probably won't be a discriminatory question on the next census questionnaire.

The bad news is that analysis I've seen has also indicated that Roberts' main argument was "We can't accept this because you lied to me (wink wink). I'll remand this for now so you can try again (wink wink nudge GOP lawyers with elbow).

The gerrymandering decision, though, is another in a series of horrible SCOTUS decisions - Citizens United, gutting the VRA, and Bush v. Gore.

Democrats need to pack the courts.
Ringo

The gerrymanding decision seems like the absolute worst decision to me. It basically seems that many states will try to ensure one party stays in power for the forseeable future -- it doesn't matter if the state is Republican or Democrat.

The big issue is that you have computer software now that can determine how the lines need to be drawn to "maximize" the number of representatives one side will get in future elections. It bothers me that, from the little I've read so far, Roberts used a "intent of the Founders" claim to decide it when the Founders could never have envisioned a software program that is specifically used to "negate" the votes of millions of voters, and would have been appaled by the idea of using that software to benefit one political party.

 

[Ringo84]

The gerrymanding decision seems like the absolute worst decision to me. It basically seems that many states will try to ensure one party stays in power for the forseeable future -- it doesn't matter if the state is Republican or Democrat.

The big issue is that you have computer software now that can determine how the lines need to be drawn to "maximize" the number of representatives one side will get in future elections. It bothers me that, from the little I've read so far, Roberts used a "intent of the Founders" claim to decide it when the Founders could never have envisioned a software program that is specifically used to "negate" the votes of millions of voters, and would have been appaled by the idea of using that software to benefit one political party.

Yeah, it's beyond ridiculous to divine what men who died over two hundred years ago would have thought about software programs.

I'm almost positive that the founders would have been quick to rebuke any future generations' attempts to go with their opinions (which varied, because they were definitely not of one mind on most things) all the time when governing their country. The point of the Constitution is that as the understanding and view of law changes, the Constitution evolves with it. ""Originalism"" is as phony as the arguments used to uphold gerrymandering.
Ringo

 

[JacobKStarkey]

A worm in the apple exists for Roberts down the line.

When the National Popular Vote comes to SCOTUS, precedent will already be created to defer to the legislatures to make such decisions.

The NPV decision was be bedrocked on the gerrymander decision.

That will create the GOP as a permanent minority party until it changes to represent the majority of the voters.

 

[variant]

The gerrymanding decision seems like the absolute worst decision to me. It basically seems that many states will try to ensure one party stays in power for the forseeable future -- it doesn't matter if the state is Republican or Democrat.

The big issue is that you have computer software now that can determine how the lines need to be drawn to "maximize" the number of representatives one side will get in future elections. It bothers me that, from the little I've read so far, Roberts used a "intent of the Founders" claim to decide it when the Founders could never have envisioned a software program that is specifically used to "negate" the votes of millions of voters, and would have been appaled by the idea of using that software to benefit one political party.

The founders envisioned house districts that would comprise 1 house member for ever 30,000 people so this is just a "made up" intention of the founders. They never envisioned anything of the sort and wanted us to solve these problems on our own.

 

[LoAmmi]

The founders envisioned house districts that would comprise 1 house member for ever 30,000 people so this is just a "made up" intention of the founders. They never envisioned anything of the sort and wanted us to solve these problems on our own.

I always find it amazing that the voices of the Founders the originalists hear tend to echo their own beliefs.

 

[Goonie]

So when are the originalists going to legalise the buying/selling/owning of slaves? Since clearly founders intended this to be legal.

 

[iluvatar5150]

The gerrymanding decision seems like the absolute worst decision to me. It basically seems that many states will try to ensure one party stays in power for the forseeable future -- it doesn't matter if the state is Republican or Democrat.

The big issue is that you have computer software now that can determine how the lines need to be drawn to "maximize" the number of representatives one side will get in future elections. It bothers me that, from the little I've read so far, Roberts used a "intent of the Founders" claim to decide it when the Founders could never have envisioned a software program that is specifically used to "negate" the votes of millions of voters, and would have been appaled by the idea of using that software to benefit one political party.

The founders envisioned house districts that would comprise 1 house member for ever 30,000 people so this is just a "made up" intention of the founders. They never envisioned anything of the sort and wanted us to solve these problems on our own.

The founders left it up to the states to decide how they wanted to apportion their representatives. Single-member districts didn't become mandated until 1842. Prior to that, states decided for themselves whether they wanted to allocate their representatives to districts, how many would be allocated to each district, or if they were to all be elected at-large.

FairVote - Congressional District History
The 1842 Apportionment Act

 

[Ringo84]

1. Because the Constitution explicitly states that "all persons" - not "all citizens" - shall be counted.
2. Because non-citizens does not necessarily constitute "illegals". It could also include people with green cards or any other number of edge cases where someone isn't a citizen but is not trying to somehow commit crimes.
3. Because part of the point of the census is to determine funding and representation via geographical/population rates. Deliberately scaring people off from answering the census because they might be swept into the category of "illegal" disenfranchises geographical areas.
Ringo

 

[Speedwell]

Isn't there an American Government class taught in the high schools any more?

 

[SummerMadness]

---SE---

I remember the case with the Colorado baker where the Supreme Court said comments by people on the Civil Rights Commission meant that they had hostility toward the baker based on his religious beliefs, thus it was religious discrimination. What we have here is an explicit study, plans to hide it, and the executed plan designed to disenfranchise people in favor of white people. Racist intent matters, and arguing that the census is only meant to count citizens ignores original intent, which counted slaves too, hence the reason why they count all persons. It was also never meant to count eligible voters because the vote used to be restricted to landowning white men. Either way you slice it, the citizenship question was born of racism and white supremacy.

 

[JacobKStarkey]

The SCOTUS apparently disagrees with the naysayers.

 

[variant]

The founders left it up to the states to decide how they wanted to apportion their representatives. Single-member districts didn't become mandated until 1842. Prior to that, states decided for themselves whether they wanted to allocate their representatives to districts, how many would be allocated to each district, or if they were to all be elected at-large.

FairVote - Congressional District History
The 1842 Apportionment Act

It was not left to the states to decide the ratio of representatives to people that was done by the founding fathers in article 1, and later the congress.

 

[iluvatar5150]

It was not left to the states to decide the ratio of representatives to people that was done by the founding fathers in article 1, and later the congress.

The founders basically said that the representatives had to be divided among the states proportional to the states' populations. They never said anything about how those representatives were to be divvied up among the population within each state, which is what this case is about.

I don't like the downstream effects of this decision, but I think it was probably the correct decision. There are other ways to address this.

 

[JacobKStarkey]

One of the down stream effects of this will be SCOTUS ratifying the NPV when it comes to court.