My fellow Americans, once more I appear to ask you a simple question: How the fuck did we get here…again?
The Supreme Court of these United States is currently hearing politicizing the case of the 14th amendment, and there are some things that stick out to me as absurd, borderline insane even. Should they rule in favor of Trump, the amount of mental gymnastics required to arrive at that decision would make flat earthers seem sane.
Here, let me show you.
The President Isn’t An Officer…
You’re right. The President of the United States isn’t an officer of the United States, they are the officer of the United States. This is the person that represents this country on the international stage. This is the person that commands the armed forces. This is the person that can drop a nuke on you.
It was even well understood that this was the case at the time the 14th amendment was being ratified as indicated by the single reference of any discussion on the senate floor surrounding if the President and Vice President were included at the time of its passing:
Maryland Democratic Sen. Reverdy Johnson: “The way members of Congress and state officials had been itemized in the text. Would the disqualification clause of the amendment not cover the top posts in the executive branch? Why did you omit to exclude them?”
Maine Republican Sen. Lot Morrill: “Let me call the Senator’s attention to the words ‘or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States’,”
This ended the discussion and this point was never brought up again.
Congress Should Enforce It With Legislation
Perhaps you’re not aware of how amendments get added to the constitution?
Congress thought this was so important, they didn’t just pass a law, they fucking etched it onto the Constitution.
This Wasn’t An Insurrection…
Hmm, well, let’s take a look at the definition of insurrection:
in·sur·rec·tion /ˌinsəˈrekSH(ə)n/ — ‘a violent uprising against an authority or government’
Violent? Five people died. Check. (RIP).
Uprising? Their stated purpose was to stop the certification and prevent the government from performing an official function; some people even brought zip ties to tie up members of congress. Officials ran and hid. Check.
Authority or government? Please, remind me again, does the fucking capitol building count as a government? Yeah, it also happens to be an authority, too. Check.
This particular insurrection just happened to fail spectacularly is all.
He Said Be Peaceful!
Pleeeeeeease, he also said you have to “fight like hell” and framed it as either the election doesn’t get certified or we lose our country. His supporters didn’t ‘misunderstand’ him. It’s not like they all went to go have ice cream and write strongly worded letters after his speech.
1st Amendment
The government didn’t stop Trump from speaking. Plus, the 1st amendment doesn’t guarantee that you won’t face consequences for what you say.
For example, you don’t get to walk away after calling in a bomb threat to the White House just because the 1st amendment guarantees your right to say stupid shit.
Lastly, the 1st amendment only applies to the government. It only stops the government from telling you to shut up. It’s not relevant to my point, just an important distinction to be made whenever talking about the 1st amendment.
Salmon P. Chase
Accomplished almost nothing in regards to the 14th amendment. He ultimately delayed everything until a general amnesty was issued, which invalidated the case against Davis, and also the requirement to rule on if the Civil War amounted to an insurrection (spoiler: it does). So basically, a decision was never made.
His cohort, however, Judge Underwood ruled that “Section Three of the Amendment operated of its own force, at once, to remove every disqualified person from office;” — so the only official judicial ruling during the time that the 14th amendment was being passed was that it was self-enforcing.
Ultimately, Salmon’s only gift on this issue was stating that the 14th amendment is a punishment for insurrection. Couldn’t agree more, Salmon.
It Takes Away The Voter’s Choice
Well, yeah, that was the point. If enough people decided to vote for post-insurrectionists, then the insurrectionists win either way. The irony in this scenario is that if the insurrectionists had just ran for office, they may have won legally.
Besides, if you want to remain an eligible candidate without all these legal issues surrounding you, then I don’t know, maybe don’t claim the election was a complete sham for months and then incite people to storm a government building?
Once a candidate is deemed ineligible, whether you can vote for them or not becomes irrelevant.
Originalism
Only when it suits them.
If we were settling this debate using the tenets of originalism, then all we need is the first point in this article, even if the words President and Vice President didn’t explicitly appear in the amendment.
This Ruling Will Be a Disappointment
So now we get to the mental gymnastics. In order for the Supreme Court to rule in favor of Trump, they would have to ignore everything above. They would have to choose to actively make a terrible decision because there wouldn’t be another satisfactory explanation for it.
That’s because the implications of this ruling would be quite extraordinary. Extraordinarily stupid and predictable that is.
First, any president that incites a mob of people to violently storm a government building at the end of their term would never be held accountable—now, or in the future.
Second, each and every single person charged in connection with storming the capitol building would immediately be qualified to hold office. How? Well, if the third clause isn’t self-enforcing, that would mean that Congress would need to pass a law making it so. But if they do that, then it would invalidate Trump’s chances of ever holding office again, so my prediction is this proposed law gets a golden ticket to the Congress graveyard along partisan lines.
Even if by some miracle Congress were to pass such a law, the case would just boomerang back to the Supreme Court so they could decide what an insurrection actually is. It’s obvious that the Supreme Court is sidestepping this already. Perhaps they just need to open a dictionary?
So in the meantime, your next representative could be that shaman dude… Horned helmets for everyone!
Third, violently storming any government building and killing five people could never be classified as an insurrection in a Federal court of law, unless Congress also passed a law literally defining an insurrection to include this scenario, or new justices with different views ascend to the Supreme Court.
Do Your Job
Seriously, quit bullshitting around and do your job. A Supreme Court that rules in ambiguity is not supreme.
