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> that frees the other side to ignore the rules on issues they deem sufficiently important to them, and it goes quickly downhill from there. We’re already ther

> that frees the other side to ignore the rules on issues they deem sufficiently important to them, and it goes quickly downhill from there. We’re already there. That’s already happened. Stare decisis — remember when all the justices who just ruled to overturn Roe called it “settled law”? Remember when the Republican Senate refused to consider Obama’s Supreme Court nominee? Remember when the courts gutted the voting rights act? Remember when the courts determined the outcome of Bush v Gore? The side that “won” this argument didn’t do it by playing by the rules. Because the court doesn’t have rules. The constitution doesn’t outline any of the philosophy that you are calling “rules.” So sitting back and saying “let’s just play by the rules” is handing a victory to a side that doesn’t care for them.

JamesBarney 4y ago
The principle of Stare decisis does not mean the supreme court can't overturn any decision it's ever made. It's routinely overturned previous decisions, many times overturning previous conservative rulings to put in place liberal ones. If you watch this youtube video of Kavanaugh answering questions I never get the idea that he says he won't overturn Roe v Wage, or that it is a binding or super precedent. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bjs-qO0N2ZI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bjs-qO0N2ZI
- 32163704 4y ago
  Sure. When prior decisions are “unworkable or are badly reasoned,” then the Supreme Court may not follow precedent, and this is “particularly true in constitutional cases.” [0] But the prior decision was certainly workable, since it had been working for almost 50 years. And it certainly wasn’t too badly reasoned, since the same reasoning was applied to many other cases — situations which also were quite workable, since they were an expansion of rights, not a circumscription of them. If anything, the court created an unworkable situation by ruling the way it did; it has created chaos in the medical field for half of the states. [0]https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/stare_decisis https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/stare_decisis
  - JamesBarney 4y ago
    There are plenty of constitutional scholars (many who are liberal and pro-choice) who believe Roe v Wade was badly reasoned like Akhil Reed Amar.
  - dang 4y ago
    Could you please stop creating accounts for every few comments you post? We ban accounts that do that. This is in the site guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html. You needn't use your real name, of course, but for HN to be a community, users need some identity for other users to relate to. Otherwise we may as well have no usernames and no community, and that would be a different kind of forum. https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comment&storyText=false&prefix&page=0&query=community%20identity%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme...

JamesBarney 4y ago

The principle of Stare decisis does not mean the supreme court can't overturn any decision it's ever made. It's routinely overturned previous decisions, many times overturning previous conservative rulings to put in place liberal ones. If you watch this youtube video of Kavanaugh answering questions I never get the idea that he says he won't overturn Roe v Wage, or that it is a binding or super precedent. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bjs-qO0N2ZI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bjs-qO0N2ZI

32163704 4y ago
Sure. When prior decisions are “unworkable or are badly reasoned,” then the Supreme Court may not follow precedent, and this is “particularly true in constitutional cases.” [0] But the prior decision was certainly workable, since it had been working for almost 50 years. And it certainly wasn’t too badly reasoned, since the same reasoning was applied to many other cases — situations which also were quite workable, since they were an expansion of rights, not a circumscription of them. If anything, the court created an unworkable situation by ruling the way it did; it has created chaos in the medical field for half of the states. [0]https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/stare_decisis https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/stare_decisis
- JamesBarney 4y ago
  There are plenty of constitutional scholars (many who are liberal and pro-choice) who believe Roe v Wade was badly reasoned like Akhil Reed Amar.
- dang 4y ago
  Could you please stop creating accounts for every few comments you post? We ban accounts that do that. This is in the site guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html. You needn't use your real name, of course, but for HN to be a community, users need some identity for other users to relate to. Otherwise we may as well have no usernames and no community, and that would be a different kind of forum. https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comment&storyText=false&prefix&page=0&query=community%20identity%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme...