Archive for the ‘Second Amendment’ Category

Mehmet Oz keeps running on crime in Philly. Heres what hes saying hed do about it. – The Philadelphia Inquirer

After an hour of at-times gut-wrenching testimonials about the effect of the drug and gun crisis in Philadelphia, Mehmet Oz, who convened the community discussion, was asked what he could do about those issues as a U.S. senator.

We do have to deal with the education system, and I think the collapse of the public school systems in places like Philadelphia has dramatically worsened what was already a bad trend, Oz told reporters after the event.

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He said Congress should create a large fund of public money to allocate to each state to support school vouchers.

The response was one of a handful of ideas floated by Oz, who consistently highlights crime and drugs in Philadelphia on the campaign trail, though often without specific proposals on how he could address those problems in the Senate.

Lt. Gov John Fetterman, the Democratic candidate for Senate, who was endorsed by the citys Black police union on Thursday, released a statement accusing Oz of exploiting Philadelphias crime for political gain.

Oz repeatedly referenced Philadelphia when talking about crime during a sit-down interview with NBC News on Thursday.

READ MORE: Focusing on crime, Republicans think theyve finally put John Fetterman on the defensive

Some of this is subpoena power to ask cities: What are you doing? How is it possible that in a short period of time youve created changes that are not for the betterment of people living in Philadelphia? Oz said. Many people here in Philly think theyre part of a social experiment thats being done on them, and they dont understand where they are in the equation, how come theyre not being valued, and it seems to always be that the criminals who are getting all the attention.

He said hed support school choice and bringing a liquid natural gas export facility to Philadelphia to help the city.

READ MORE: What weve learned from a year of attending Oz and Fetterman campaign events

Oz, who is backed by the Fraternal Order of Police, held his Thursday discussion on safer streets, at a catering company in South Philadelphia. Former U.S. Attorney Bill McSwain; Mike Bresnan, president of the citys firefighters and paramedics union; several Republican ward leaders; and some Oz supporters attended the event.

Its at least the third such event in Philadelphia as Oz has worked to tap into concerns about rising gun violence in the city by attacking Fetterman as soft on crime. Oz often brings up the lieutenant governors work on the Board of Pardons and his support for reforming state mandatory life sentencing guidelines for second-degree murder.

READ MORE: Fetterman says Oz lies about my record on crime, at brief stop in Southwest Philadelphia

Oz has been scrutinized over a similar but smaller roundtable in Germantown in September that focused on gun violence. At that campaign event, Oz sat beside Sheila Armstrong, who shared her story of losing two family members to gun violence, but it was revealed this week that she works for Ozs campaign. Shes Philadelphia regional director, the campaign said, when asked by The Inquirer about her role this week.

Thursdays hourlong discussion was mostly dedicated to highlighting the ongoing suffering in the city. Clarice Schillinger, a former GOP candidate for lieutenant governor and a prominent school choice advocate, said one of the Philadelphia SWAT officers shot this week is a friend and security guard. Community activist Ikey Raw, who was also at Ozs September roundtable on gun violence, said it was easier to buy fentanyl than baby formula during periods of the pandemic, and a Kensington resident who was also with Oz when he visited the neighborhood last month said human feces is everywhere there.

Oz, who rose to national fame as a daytime TV talk show host, knows how to moderate a compelling conversation. And the issues hes highlighting are real-life tragedies for many Philadelphians. But discussions of solutions were minimal.

READ MORE: Gun-safety group launches $2.1 million ad campaign criticizing Oz, Mastriano over gun laws

Oz brought up the lack of police officers and need to improve officer retention, harsher penalties for drug dealers, and speeding up crime-victim compensation. In his interview with NBC, Oz said he opposes mandatory minimum sentences at the federal level for fentanyl dealers, saying he thinks it should be left up to judges.

At Thursdays event, Oz continually stressed his opposition to (and highlighted Fettermans support for) supervised injection sites, which do not exist anywhere in Pennsylvania.

He also said in a follow-up interview with reporters that with regard to drugs, we have got to take detox more seriously. He suggested hed support an involuntary detox program to push people suffering from drug addiction who commit minor crimes into detox.

They break the law because theyre living outside, theyll urinate or defecate, theyll do something that allows you to justify it, Oz said. Youre trying to walk them by the hand, take them to detox and give them five days of an opportunity to at least find out who they are again, and you have to do it over and over and over.

READ MORE: Oz talked to drug users in Kensington and community activists in Germantown as he continues to focus on crime in Philly

He referenced Miami as a city thats had success with driving down addiction.

When The Inquirer followed up, the campaign sent a link to an article detailing a pre-arrest diversion program in Miami that appears to mirror one that already exists in Philadelphia.

Oz also said on Thursday he supports decriminalizing marijuana for medical uses. As we get more comfortable understanding what marijuana can and cant do and standardizing what it is, then other opportunities may open, he said.

(He told NBC Bidens move to pardon some federal marijuana convictions was a rational move.)

Fetterman, who has argued hes better equipped to take on crime issues given his 13 years as a mayor of a town that dealt with the opioid crisis and gun violence, pointed to Ozs opposition to gun control as a policy that would hurt not help Philadelphias crime problem.

READ MORE: The two very different ways John Fetterman answered GOP attacks over crime and drugs

If Dr. Oz actually cared about crime hed be offering some real solutions, Fetterman said. Instead, he wont do the literal first thing to keep our neighborhoods, and our police officers, safe: he doesnt support a single policy to get guns off our streets and out of the wrong hands.

Oz opposes red flag laws, universal background checks, and any gun control measure that infringes upon the Second Amendment, according to a post he authored on his campaign website. I will fight against federal gun control schemes and I will vote for judicial nominees who share my view, he says in the post. Hes dodged questions about whether he would have supported the bipartisan Gun Safety Act that was signed over the summer.

The event on Thursday included several Democrats turned Republicans frustrated by gun violence who shrugged off Ozs anti-gun-control stances.

The problem is the ghost guns, the illegal guns. Theyre already illegal, so its how do we stop that? said Carnel Harley, a Republican ward leader in Nicetown who left the Democratic Party six years ago. Harley said he didnt mind that Oz came to the discussion without a lot of answers.

One thing I liked about him is, he didnt say what he could do. He asked what do I need him to do for our community.

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Mehmet Oz keeps running on crime in Philly. Heres what hes saying hed do about it. - The Philadelphia Inquirer

Delaware ghost gun decision followed the law | READER COMMENTARY – Baltimore Sun

I teach Second Amendment classes and have comments regarding The Baltimore Suns recent ghost gun editorial (In Delaware, a worrisome challenge to ghost gun restrictions, Sept. 28). The editorial omitted critical considerations related to Judge Maryellen Noreikas recent decision blocking enforcement of Delawares law banning possession and distribution of ghost guns.

The Sun may have not cared for the holding, but Judge Noreika is a careful and deliberate jurist. She did what was required of her by the recent United States Supreme Court decision in New York State Rifle and Pistol v. Bruen. She is not entitled to make up the law or follow her personal bias whatever that may be.

Junes New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen case was a sea change decision for the Second Amendment. It held that when the Second Amendments plain text covers an individuals conduct the Constitution protects that conduct. To justify the restriction, Delaware was required to demonstrate to the court that the enacted ban is consistent with the nations historic tradition of firearms regulation. The Delaware attorney general failed to make that showing and the judges hands were tied. She had to, and did, follow New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen. In other words, to enforce this law she had to find that Delawares ban was consistent with a historic tradition of regulation as it existed at the time of the founding. The judge cant be faulted for doing her job. Had she not followed this very recent Supreme Court precedent, she would be called an activist judge.

Judge Noreikas decision is not binding on any court sitting in Maryland, but Bruen binds Maryland courts, and Maryland will face this same challenge when it seeks to enforce its ghost gun ban. Perhaps Maryland will take its cue from the Delaware decision and will be prepared to tie historic tradition of regulations that existed at the time of the founding or soon after into its ghost gun restriction. If it is unable to do so, it will fail.

James B. Astrachan, Baltimore

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Delaware ghost gun decision followed the law | READER COMMENTARY - Baltimore Sun

Election 2022: What to know about constitutional amendments – WyoFile

Wyoming voters will decide the fate of two constitutional amendments in Novembers general election. One proposes to change the retirement age for certain judges, while the other would allow municipalities to invest in stocks in the same manner the state does.

Changing the Wyoming Constitution involves a lengthy process originating with the Legislature. Both amendments began as legislation and received the required two-thirds supermajority in both the House and the Senate. That move sent them to the ballot for voter consideration.

Cities, counties and towns currently have the ability to make low-risk, fixed income investments, such as certificates of deposit, federal agency bonds and U.S. Treasurys.

If voters approve Amendment A, those municipalities would have the option to invest in equities, like the stock market, just as the state does.

Rep. Pat Sweeney (R-Casper) brought a bill to the Legislature earlier this year to get the amendment on the ballot. He introduced the legislation following the sale of Wyoming Medical Center, for which Natrona County received more than $100 million. The Board of County Commissioners then agreed to invest those funds rather than spend them.

However, because the countys investment options are limited, the funds are yielding very minimal returns, according to Paul Bertoglio, a Natrona County Commissioner and proponent of the amendment. If properly invested and managed for long-term returns, the funds could provide additional revenue for local governments without any additional taxes, he said. With decreases in coal and oil and gas production, Bertoglio expects the state to be under increasing pressure to cut, including funding for local governments.

At some point, theyre going to have no choice but to start cutting back what they give us, and that is the value of this it gives us an independent revenue stream that offsets some of those cuts, he said.

The Wyoming County Commissioners Association has endorsed the amendment, but with the expectation that the Legislature will create rules requiring long-term investing by municipalities be done by professional portfolio managers instead of local officials.

The Wyoming County Treasurers Association, meanwhile, opposes the amendment.

The volatility of the market means that losses are inevitable, and county treasurers believe any loss of the funds entrusted to us is unacceptable, the association wrote in an open letter to the public.

While investing in equities would indeed provide higher yields, it would also come with unacceptable risk, according to the treasurers.

The investment of public funds is rooted in a system of trust, and we are very aware of your expectations. To that end, the safety of your money should be the priority, over yield and other political considerations, the letter stated.

The amendment mirrors one from 2016 that granted the state the ability to invest in equities.

The second amendment on the ballot faces no apparent, organized opposition.

If approved by voters, Amendment B would change the required retirement age for Wyoming Supreme Court justices and district court judges from 70 to 75.

Mandatory judicial retirement at age 70 has resulted in the loss of many eminently qualified Justices and Judges in Wyoming, according to a fact sheet from the Wyoming Judicial Branch. If the mandatory retirement age were extended, not only could these members of the judiciary continue to meaningfully contribute to the law in Wyoming, longer service would also result in a net savings for the state.

Wyoming is one of 17 states that has a mandatory judicial retirement age of 70, according to the fact sheet.

As a Judiciary Committee bill in the Legislature, the proposal faced little opposition. In the House, it passed third reading 54-5 with one excused. In the Senate, it passed 20-10.

Sen. Tom James (R-Green River) voted against the amendment because he opposes extending appointments for any position which has decisions over the peoples Constitutional rights, he wrote in an email to WyoFile. He added that he believes judges should be elected, not appointed.

Since 2000, some 20 constitutional amendments have appeared on the ballot in Wyoming, according to secretary of state records. Twelve of those were approved, including one in 2012 guaranteeing citizens the right to make their own healthcare decisions, which is now at the center of a lawsuit involving Wyomings abortion trigger law. The other eight amendments were defeated by voters. Early voting in Wyoming is currently underway. The general election is Nov. 8.

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Election 2022: What to know about constitutional amendments - WyoFile

Supreme Illegitimacy – The Regulatory Review

A terrible trio of Supreme Court cases from last term illustrates the need for judicial reform, which can occur through several options.

In a single week in June 2022, at the close of its last term, the U.S. Supreme Court undermined its own political legitimacy through three decisions: New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen, Dobbs v. Jackson Womens Health Organization, and West Virginia v. Environmental Protection Agency. Each of these decisions strikes at a core justification for any government: the need to protect the lives of its people.

Conservative and liberal political theories of different stripes agree that a foundational purpose of government is to preserve the lives and assure the safety of its citizens. They agree that government is justified by the need to preserve civil order through law, ideally through democratic processes, to protect the unalienable right to life.

Protecting the right to life is a primary justification for the consent of citizens to the authority of government in the social contract tradition of Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau, which informed revolutions establishing democratic republics in the United States and Europe. Since then, long-standing questions have persisted about whose lives matter and who counts as citizens. A foundational principle, however, remains that government must protect the right to life of its citizens to remain politically legitimate.

For this reason, it is shocking to see the Supreme Court acting contrary to the right to life of millions of Americans with respect to gun safety, reproductive health, and climate damage. The Courts self-inflicted political illegitimacy demands immediate reform.

To begin with some conceptual background, legitimacy is an essentially contested concept in social theory. For purposes here, one can distinguish the following kinds of legitimacy: legal legitimacy, empirical political legitimacy, and substantive political legitimacy.

Legal legitimacy refers to whether the enactment of laws and their application follow agreed standards of rationality and interpretation. The frequent and arbitrary interference of an authoritarian leader in particular cases, for example, would void legal legitimacy.

Empirical political legitimacy refers to whether citizens in a specific government believe law-making and law-applying processes accord with their fundamental values, including, for example, following democratic procedures and trusting judges to act fairly.

Substantive political legitimacy refers to whether a legal and political system adheres to a minimum standard of moral coherence and normative justification of political authority. A regime that deprives a large mass of its citizens of vital rights loses this kind of legitimacy.

Owing to its decisions at the end of its last term, the Supreme Court has lost legitimacy along all three dimensions. Most decisively, the Court has lost its substantive political legitimacy by preventing the government from protecting the right to life of millions of Americans against gun violence, reproductive health risks, and degenerative climate consequences.

My argument that the Court has wrongly decided these cases is not simply a legal or constitutional one. It is an argument based in political and democratic theory that the current Court has lost its substantive political legitimacy, thus mandating its structural reform.

The first instance of the Courts misfiring came in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen. The Court in this case overturned a century-old New York state gun licensing statute through an expansive interpretation of the Second Amendment. In an earlier decision, District of Columbia v. Heller, the Court had previously struck down a law that prohibited the possession of handguns in the home as a violation of the Second Amendment. But in Bruen, the Court went further to require any gun licensing regime to give citizens a right to meet objective criteria to carry a gun in public.

Purportedly grounded in history, Justice Clarence Thomass majority opinion in fact flies in the face of hundreds of years of the government regulating dangerous weapons to keep people safe in their homes, on the streets, in their schools, and in their workplaces. Thomas argues that the Second Amendment enshrines an individual right to carry arms following a tradition going back to the first kings of England. The true history shows a gradual empowering of the state to restrict the public carry of weapons. As one historian explains, Thomass opinion is rambling and adopts an almost childlike caricature of historical method.

More than the bad history and bad law, Bruen is politically illegitimate because of its predictable consequences. It will exacerbate gun violence by impeding federal, state, and local governments from enacting common-sense gun safety regulations to preserve many human lives. Striking down the licensing statute in New York also overturned similar laws in six other states and the District of Columbia, and has thrown into doubt other important gun safety regulations.

The Court has done so at a time when doctors describe gun violence as an epidemic. Justice Stephen Breyers dissent provides the grisly details. Simply reciting the names of places of recent gun massacresPhiladelphia, Uvalde, Buffalo, Atlanta, Dayton, Orlando, Charleston, Aurora, Newtown, and morerecalls a toll of many innocent lives lost, including many children. Since 2010, gun-related deaths have increased more than 44 percent. Gun-related deaths now exceed 45,000 annually, surpassing car accidents as a cause of death. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that 48,832 gun deaths in 2021 is the highest number of gun deaths in 30 years.

The Courts majority in Bruen is oblivious to the carnage. Justice Samuel Alito, in a concurring opinion, repeats a gun lobby trope about anecdotal cases of good guys with guns who foil public assaults. But he fails to grapple with the grim nationwide statistics. Studies show that the good guy with a gun is a statistical unicorn.

Bruen compounds the Courts misinterpretation of the Second Amendment in Heller by announcing what is essentially a new constitutional right of vigilantism. The Court refuses to give credence to the post-Heller test developed by eleven Courts of Appeals that balanced the governments interest in preventing gun violence against Second Amendment rights. Last week, a federal judge illustrated the destructive scope of Bruen by striking down provisions of New Yorks post-Bruen gun safety legislation, including the prohibition of guns in sensitive areas such as museums, theaters, stadiums, libraries, bars, and even child care facilities.

No modern government can maintain its political legitimacy without keeping its citizens safe from an epidemic of gun violence. As the philosopher Amanda Greene reasons, legitimacy is not possible while there is open conflict and threat of violence.

If Bruen threatens the safety of all Americans wherever they may go in public, a second legitimacy-shattering decision endangers the lives of many women.

In Dobbs v. Jackson Womens Health Organization, the Court struck down the 50-year old precedent of Roe v. Wade. Whatever one may think of the morality of abortion, the problem for the Courts political legitimacy is that its radical decision will inevitably cause the deaths of many pregnant persons. This choice is ironic, given the Courts intention to protect prenatal life.

The Court heard evidence that reversing Roe and its precedents would cause many deaths from lack of professional medical attention, a return to unclean or improvised abortions, and forcing mothers with serious health risks to give birth. The Courts majority did not care. Justice Alito, writing for the majority, noted impassioned and conflicting arguments about the effects of the abortion right on the lives of women, but then ignored the evidence.

In dissent, Justices Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, and Elena Kagan observed that Roe and its precedents allowed states to prohibit abortions after fetal viability, so long as the ban contained exceptions to safeguard a womans life or health. Dobbs now frees the states to adopt any legal restriction beginning at conception, including criminal penalties against mothers and doctors. It recognizes no exceptions for pregnancies resulting from rape or incest, nor for fatal birth defects or complications that risk a mothers life.

Speaking plainly, the Court has condemned many women to death. Women who carry a pregnancy to term are 14 times more likely to die than when abortion terminates a pregnancy. They are 75 times more likely to die in Mississippi, the state where Dobbs arose. Moreover, researchers have estimated that a ban on abortions increases maternal mortality by 21 percent, with white women facing a 13 percent increase in maternal mortality while black women face a 33 percent increase. The Courts majority has the blood of these women on its hands.

It is one thing to bestow a new constitutional right. It is quite another to withdraw a preexisting, settled right knowing that the decision will kill many people who have relied on it.

At oral argument, Justice Sotomayor asked: Will this institution survive the stench that this creates in the public perception that the Constitution and its reading are just political acts? I do not see how it is possible. She is right.

Last but not least, the Courts decision in West Virginia v. EPA impedes governmental power to address the most difficult and threatening problem that humanity has ever faced: global climate disruption. Once again, the Court undercuts the ability of government to preserve the right to life of present and, in this case, future generations.

The climate emergency is here. As Justice Kagan observes in her dissenting opinion, many deaths are already occurring from an increasing severity of heatwaves, droughts, wildfires, storms, and floods. By the end of the century, human-caused climate disruption may account for as many as 4.6 million excess yearly deaths. The Courts majority simply shrugs off the scientific facts of these dangers.

The majoritys arrogance in West Virginia is astonishing. It reaches out to review a moot Obama-era Clean Power Plan, and then creates an entirely new major questions doctrine to restrict governmental authority. As Justice Kagan writes, this doctrine appears magically as a get-out-of-text-free card to prevent agencies from doing important work, even though that is what the U.S. Congress directed.

Professor Richard Revesz confirms that the new major questions doctrine announced in West Virginia, and effectively applied in an earlier case National Federation of Independent Business v. Department of Labor, casts an ominous pall over the nations regulatory future. Even though Congress acted in August to re-empower the EPA by adopting a statute overturning the effect of West Virginia with respect to the agencys authority to regulate greenhouse gases, the new major questions doctrine will continue to impede effective climate and other health-related policies.

As in Bruen and Dobbs, the Courts new doctrine announced in West Virginia will kill people. Taken together, the cases count three strikes against the Courts political legitimacy by preventing the political branches from acting to protect the basic right to life of its citizens.

One may also assess the legal legitimacy of these decisions as egregiously wrong. Bruen extends a wrong-headed originalist interpretation of the Second Amendment and adds historical errors. Dobbs lacks any coherent legal analysis on the merits and violates the principle of stare decisis, overturning the 50-year old precedent of Roe as well as the 30-year-old precedent on precedent of Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey. And West Virginia conjures a brand new major questions doctrine to prune the authority of the administrative state.

My argument here, however, does not focus on the weaknesses in the Courts constitutional interpretation or legal methodology. A deeper, unifying feature of these cases is that they are politically illegitimate because they subvert the governments authority to protect citizens lives with respect to gun violence, reproductive health, and climate damage.

Not surprisingly, these decisions are unpopular with the public, eroding the Courts political empirical legitimacy as well. Public opinion polls show the Court at its lowest approval ratings on record. In the latest Gallup survey, a record low of only 47 percent of Americans say they trust the judicial branch headed by the U.S. Supreme Court. Only 40 percent approve of how the Court is doing its job.

The Courts loss of both substantive and empirical political legitimacy means that the quality assent of citizens needed to justify it has vanished. A major political structural adjustment is therefore required. A Supreme Court that has lost its political legitimacy must be reformed. Otherwise, our government as a whole could lose legitimacy, tilting the political world toward chaos.

Although it is rare, this is not the first time in history that the Court has launched itself into political illegitimacy. And the political branches, Congress and the President, have corrected the Courts course before.

There are two important historical precedents. The first followed the Courts worst decision ever, Dred Scott v. Sandford, which held that no enslaved or free black person had federal constitutional rights. Dred Scott sparked the Civil War, and its breach of legitimacy was repaired only by the recognition of rights in the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments, along with the federal civil rights statutes adopted in the 1960s.

Another low moment for the Court occurred when it repeatedly struck down many statutes passed in the early days of President Franklin D. Roosevelts New Deal.

In these previous moments of lost judicial legitimacy, the political branches responded. During the Civil War, Congress increased the number of Supreme Court justices to ten, giving President Abraham Lincoln another appointment, and Congress then reduced the number to seven to prevent President Andrew Johnson from appointing justices to undo Reconstructionwhich, unfortunately, later occurred anyway.

Responding to the Courts evisceration of the New Deal, President Roosevelt threatened to appoint as many as six additional justices, depending on how many sitting justices reached the age of 70. This threat encouraged the switch in time that saved nine when a few justices changed their tune and upheld New Deal legislation.

The United States faces another constitutional legitimation crisis today. Fortunately, there is a menu of choices available to address it. The Presidential Commission on the Supreme Court of the United States issued a report in December 2021 examining options for reform.

In reviewing the options, any reform should meet two conditions. First, statutory interventions rather than constitutional amendments are needed because there is no time for a constitutional amendment. Second, any reform when adopted must dislodge the current majority that is acting illegitimately.

Here are three specific options that could be adopted singly or in combination.

1. Expand the Court to 13 justices. The power of Congress to alter the number of justices on the Court is long established as constitutional. The number of justices has fluctuated historically between a minimum of five and a maximum of ten, and the Commission determined that there is widespread agreement among legal scholars that Congress has the constitutional authority to expand the Courts size. Law professors and former judgesincluding Michael Klarman, Mark Tushnet, Nancy Gertner, and Lawrence Tribesupport expanding the membership of the Court.

Expanding the Court to 13 justices would counter the Machiavellian machinations of Senator Mitch McConnell. As Majority Leader, McConnell refused even to hold hearings on President Barack H. Obamas appointment of Merrick Garland. McConnell later rushed through a confirmation of President Donald J. Trumps appointment of Amy Coney Barrett, thus arguably stealing two appointments for Republicans. Giving President Joseph R. Biden the power to appoint four justices would rebalance the Court to a seven-six Democratic-to-Republican ratio.

Other justifications to expand the Court include increasing the number of justices to handle an increasing workload, returning to a tradition of one justice for each court of appeals, and conforming to the numbers of judges on the highest courts of other democratic governments in the world, which range from seven to 18.

2. Establish 18-year term limits for justices. Federal judges have a constitutional right to lifetime appointment, but this does not mean that Congress cannot set term limits specifically for the Supreme Court. As the Commission on the Supreme Court recognizes, rotation systems are possible. Retroactively imposing an 18-year term limit would require Justice Thomas to retire immediately, Chief Justice John Roberts in 2023, and Justice Alito in 2024.

Two thirds of Americans favor terms limits for the Courts justices, according to a recent poll.

3. Set a mandatory retirement age of 75. Following the same logic that lifetime judicial appointments do not necessarily entail lifetime appointments to the Supreme Court, Congress could set a retirement age of, say, 75. Retired justices could remain active as senior judges by special designation to lower courts or as special masters. Setting a retirement age of 75 would require Justice Thomas to retire next year, Justice Alito in three years, Justice Sotomayor in seven years, and Chief Justice Roberts in eight years.

The Commissions report reviews other alternatives as well, including jurisdiction stripping, a supermajority requirement for constitutional review of statutes, legislative overrides, a mandatory code of judicial ethics, and recusal rules for conflicts of interest. Other creative options include a Supreme Court lottery that entails randomly drawing Supreme Court panels for each case from a pool of all appellate judges, and a balanced bench comprising five justices appointed by Democrats, five by Republicans, and five by the ten politically appointed justices.

One might argue that rejiggering the structure of the Court may also have detrimental consequences for its legitimacy, causing it to become even more political or politicized. The United States, however, stands very far away today from dreams of neutral principles. The Courts illegitimacy has become not just legal or even political; it is now existential.

At a conference last month, Chief Justice Roberts said, I dont understand the connection between opinions that people disagree with and the legitimacy of the Court. He confuses legal legitimacy and political legitimacy. The problem is not just that the Court is getting the law wrong. Worse even than acting as politicians in robes, the Courts current majority is taking an axe to a foundational root of the political legitimacy of government: the power to protect the right to life of its people.

Because the Court has become the most dangerous branch, arrogantly heedless of the human and environmental consequences of the jurisprudence it so ruthlessly imposes, it must be stopped. Congress and the President must determine the exact mode of reform, but some effective change of the Courts structure is essential to restore its political legitimacy.

Eric W. Orts is the Guardsmark Professor at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

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Supreme Illegitimacy - The Regulatory Review

What is the Second Amendment? | Fox News

The Second Amendment in the Bill of Rights guarantees gun rights for millions of Americans and has contributed to the United States becoming the most heavily armed population in the world.

However, every state interprets the "right to bear arms" and a "well-regulated militia" differently. More recently, Congress passed the most significant gun control bill in 30 years that incentivizes states to enforce more red flag laws and expands background checks for gun owners between 18-21-years-old. The legislation directly results from the Uvalde shooting in Texas that left dozens of children dead.

Although The Supreme Court has thrown out state gun regulations that they view as unconstitutional, like in the recent case of New York, where the Court ruled 6-3 against a law that made it difficult to obtain a concealed carry handgun license. Nevertheless, the Second Amendment is at the center of the gun control debate and is blamed by Democratic politicians for the rise of mass shootings.

The original text of the Second Amendment in the Bill of Rights states, "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed." The text has been interpreted as the right for individuals to buy and protect themselves with guns. In 2008, the Supreme Court reaffirmed that individuals may use this right for self-defense and other lawful purposes.

The United States has the most heavily armed citizenry in the world. (iStock)

HOUSE PASSES SWEEPING GUN CONTROL BILL AMID SERIES OF MASS SHOOTINGS

The Court also ruled state governments, like the federal government, may not infringe upon this right.

Why was the Second Amendment created? In modern times a common belief is that the Second Amendment was made to protect the right of citizens to hunt or defend their homes from unlawful entry. While these are examples of rights the Second Amendment protects, the historical purpose is broader.

SENATE PASSES BIPARTISAN GUN CONTROL BILL

The historical purpose of the Second Amendment, according to constitutional scholars, was to give the citizenry of the newly formed nation the ability to fight against a tyrannical government and defend itself against unlawful violence. This mindset comes from the framers of the Constitution, who had just defeated the British Empire and wanted to ensure a tyrannical government would be less likely in the future.

James Madison, one of the founding fathers and framers of the Constitution, proposed the Second Amendment at the Constitutional Convention because he feared the government could use a centralized military to oppress an unarmed citizenry.

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What is the Second Amendment? | Fox News