Thursday’s Supreme Court decision on Obamacare is a tragic setback to the nascent movement of “political constitutionalism.” For three years, beginning with the emergence of the Tea Party, millions of citizens joined together in trying to settle the broad meaning of the Constitution . . . . Continue Reading »
1. When looking at the Obamacare case, many wondered if the individual insurance purchase mandate was severable from the rest of Obamacare. According to the Chief Justice, the mandate is severable from itself. You take (what he admits to be) an unconstitutional scheme of mandate . . . . Continue Reading »
I’ve been reading the “The Roberts decision is not as mad and bad as you think” essays this evening. I offer you this by Joshua Hawley, this by Paul Rahe and this by Timothy Dalrymple. A positive way of looking at today’s SC decision is to say that we never . . . . Continue Reading »
1. While sitting at JFK waiting for a plane, I realized that Carl, Peter, and Pete were on to something in their discussion of deferential, minimalist judicial activism. 2. All day I kept thinking of the Art. I provision requiring all bills for the raising of revenue to originate in the House. On . . . . Continue Reading »
It appears that I’ve been punished for saying that judicial activism through judicial restraint is impossible. I’m okay with Roberts working hard to find a way to uphold the law rather than strike it down 5-4. But in this case his method seems to have been to mangle the plain sense of . . . . Continue Reading »
isn’t necessarily the Chief Justice John Roberts-written opinion - or rather it is necessarily going to be the Roberts-written opinion for very long. In his majority opinion, Roberts wrote that the interstate commerce clause does not give Congress the power to mandate that individuals . . . . Continue Reading »
Since I want films about any and every sort of pop music since the advent of jazz, and about the rock music of 1966 to the present, for this topic I’m sort of overlooking the rock v. rock n’ roll distinction I insist upon elsewhere . And since what I really want are films that convey what . . . . Continue Reading »
1. I certainly wouldn’t mind abandoning the phrase, although someone should send the memo to Heritage (for example). 2. Judicial activism is becoming more nonpartisan or transpartisan as a concept. Our friend Ross Douthat writes today that conservatives should be happy that liberals are . . . . Continue Reading »
The Supreme Court just overruled multiple democratically elected legislatures to impose its policy preferences on the country by a narrow 5-4 majority. Keep that in mind tomorrow if (IF!) the Supreme Court strikes down the Obamacare individual health insurance purchase mandate. Just . . . . Continue Reading »
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