The Role John Roberts Can Play In The Senate Trial…And Power He Already Wields At His Day Job
December 20, 2019
ALL EYES ON ME IN THE CENTER OF THE RING
|“U.S. Chief Justice JOHN ROBERTS is poised to serve a highly visible though largely ceremonial role in the Senate impeachment trial of President Donald Trump due next month. But it is in his day job on the Supreme Court that the mild-mannered jurist could have a bigger impact on Trump’s presidency.” Reuters reports on the role Roberts will play in the forthcoming Senate trial (whenever that may be), as well as the one he more critically plays at his day job. “While the senators — not Roberts — set the rules for the trial and determine its outcome, he is positioned to play a central role in deciding significant cases now before the nine-member court that will directly impact Trump.”
SHOW DON'T TELL
|Jess Bravin with The Wall Street Journal writes that the impeachment of PRESIDENT TRUMP offers CHIEF JUSTICE JOHN ROBERTS “a chance to distinguish the judiciary from the partisanship engulfing the Capitol.” Because the Supreme Court does not allow cameras in its courtroom, a televised Senate trial will give the American public a unique opportunity to observe the chief justice — and under circumstances he likely isn’t thrilled about. Bravin notes, “In the 14 years since PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH nominated him to succeed the late WILLIAM REHNQUIST, Chief Justice Roberts strived to portray the judiciary as an institution apart from the political branches of the presidency and Congress. While Republicans and Democrats have fought bitterly over judicial vacancies, he has insisted that the courts resolve disputes despite ideological differences. The nature of impeachment, with legislative bodies employing judicial-type procedures to accuse and decide guilt in alleged political crimes rather than legal infractions, confuses those distinctions.”
THE TIES THAT BIND
|Mark Joseph Stern with Slate reports on the two new cases SCOTUS took up this week regarding the rights of religious school employees. These two case both ask justices to consider whether “sectarian schools can insulate themselves from lawsuits by employees who allege that they’ve been unlawfully mistreated.” And as Stern adds, “Both give the court an opportunity to expand the scope of religious employers’ constitutional liberty to violate employment laws that bind everybody else.”
DOUBLE ENCORE
|Just when we thought it had its last rodeo, it looks like the Affordable Care Act could get yet another day in court before the justices. Richard Wolf with USA Today covers the ACA’s potential Supreme Court return after a Democratic coalition of state attorneys general said Thursday that they may ask SCOTUS for an encore save of Obamacare. “The officials, led by California Attorney General XAVIER BECERRA, said a third trip to the Supreme Court in eight years may be necessary after a federal appeals court’s ruling Wednesday that struck down the law’s requirement that most consumers buy health insurance. A panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit, based in New Orleans, sent the case back to a federal district court to decide whether other parts of the law can be saved without that requirement, called the individual mandate.The ruling leaves the law intact for now, with an uncertain future. As a result, Becerra and other Democrats fighting to save President Barack Obama’s top domestic policy achievement said the Supreme Court should save the Affordable Care Act – something the justices did in 2012 and again in 2015.”
CLEAN-UP ON AISLE 3
|The Editorial Board of The New York Times weighs in on the pending challenges to the Affordable Care Act. The Ed Board writes, “If you’re wondering why the courts are considering the legality of the Affordable Care Act after the Supreme Court already determined it was the law of the land, you have DONALD TRUMP and congressional Republicans to thank.” The piece concludes, “It will likely yet fall to the Supreme Court to clean up the mess. CHIEF JUSTICE JOHN ROBERTS has shown little appetite for existential threats to the health care law, but staunch Republicans give him no choice. ‘It is not our job to protect the people from the consequences of their political choices,’ Chief Justice Roberts wrote in the 2012 landmark that saved Obamacare from doom. But he may need to protect us from the consequences of elected officials’ political choices.”