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No. By its very nature an amendment is constitutional.

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That is what I've always thought, and that's the way it should be in my opinion.

But there is precedent in other countries for what is being called "unconstitutional constitutional amendment doctrine." Here are two of the countries in question (and note that India borrowed heavily from the U.S. when drafting their constitution):

The above pic is a screenshot from the Wikipedia page on unconstitutional constitutional amendments.

Going back to the U.S., I trust that SCOTUS would honor the will of the people, considering how much consensus it takes to pass a constitutional amendment (2/3 of House and Senate + 3/4 of States, or Constitutional Convention). But there is technically nothing stopping them from striking an amendment down, or at least attempting to.

Remember, SCOTUS gave themselves the power to strike down unconstitutional laws in Marbury v. Madison. Nowhere in the Constitution does it say they should have that power. So I don't think it's very far-fetched to envision a scenario in which SCOTUS tries to expand that power to constitutional amendments, especially if the amendment in question is imposing term limits on them. That would be the worst-case scenario.

Here's an academic journal article on this topic from a more reputable source, the Maryland Law Review.

Need limits on the bureaucrats' time as government employees.

18 for Congress too, or GTFO.

OneAnd19More said:

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As others have pointed out, Article 3 Section 1 of the Constitution says that a Supreme Court justice can hold their office as long as they exercise good behavior. Any bill that is passed to impose term limits on SCOTUS could be struck down as unconstitutional. It would take a constitutional amendment to "override" Article 3 Section 1.

Here's where it gets interesting: does SCOTUS have the power to declare a constitutional amendment unconstitutional? Could they strike down the very amendment that is attempting to impose term limits on them?
SCOTUS gave themselves the power of judicial review in Marbury v. Madison (1803). It has been theorized that this power could extend to constitutional amendments as well, but they have never tried to strike one down before.

Eventually there will be a landmark Supreme Court case where they have to decide whether or not they have the power to review the "constitutionality" of constitutional amendments.

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I think the only proper review there would be process. If the group trying to pass the amendment didn't go through the constitutional process to adopt an amendment, I could see SCOTUS saying the amendment isn't yet adopted.

I guess I could also see where SCOTUS says that the amendment makes the constitution contridict itself, but that would have to be pretty blatent. Other than those two situations, I don't see where SCOTUS can weigh in on amendments. They interpret the constitution, they don't write it.

TMfrisco said:

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A better Bill would be to go back to 60 votes needed to confirm and make sure there is no way to change it. Supreme Court appointments should have to have some degree of bipartisanship.

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The same should be said about major social legislation, such as healthcare reform, once Obamacare is struck. Of course, that already cost Dems both houses, one time.

Getting rid of pensions will take care of a good chunk of lifers.

I'm also in favor of changing the the President to a single, six-year term. Gives them time to learn, govern, and get something done without having to campaign. Also make it illegal for the President to do any campaigning - for anybody - while in office. Just get elected and get to work.

for Congress, I like 4 terms in the house and 2 in the senate

Can we just start at limiting Reps to 6 2-year terms and Senators to 2 6-year terms? And put all of them on a defined salary of, well, a whole lot less than they get now, plus they get to pay for their own travel, insurance, etc.

Congress passes crap and relies on the legal challenges to that crap to laboriously set the boundaries and correct the details.

Prognightmare said:

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https://apple.news/AvqrN8mCOSYmAs4KKHhS4XA

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-court-termlimits-idUSKCN26F3L3

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NEW YORK (Reuters) - Democrats in of the House of Representatives will introduce a bill next week to limit the tenure of U.S. Supreme Court justices to 18 years from current lifetime appointments, in a bid to reduce partisan warring over vacancies and preserve the court's legitimacy.

The new bill, seen by Reuters, would allow every president to nominate two justices per four-year term and comes amid heightened political tensions as Republican President Donald Trump prepares to announce his third pick for the Supreme Court after the death on Sept. 18 of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, with just 40 days to go until the Nov. 3 election.

"It would save the country a lot of agony and help lower the temperature over fights for the court that go to the fault lines of cultural issues and is one of the primary things tearing at our social fabric," said California U.S. Representative Ro Khanna, who plans to introduce the legislation on Tuesday, along with Representatives Joe Kennedy III of Massachusetts and Don Beyer of Virginia.

Partly due to rising life expectancies, justices serve increasingly long tenures, on average now more than 25 years.

Term limits for high court justices have for years had support from a number of legal scholars on both the right and the left. Several polls in recent years have also shown large majorities of the American public support term limits.

The bill - the Supreme Court Term Limits and Regular Appointments Act - is the first to try to set Supreme Court term limits by statute, according to Gabe Roth, the executive director of Fix the Court, a judicial transparency group whose campaign for high court term limits has been gaining attention.

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I can agree with this but let's wrap term limits of Congress critters in with it.

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I would definitely sign off / agree on this.

We should also do 10 terms for house members since they only get 2 years per.

4 terms for senators.

Anything else is a bit excessive. We don't need people spending 50+ years in Congress or on the courts.

YokelRidesAgain said:

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Ag87H2O said:

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Just like the Electoral College, the Dems always want to change the rules when it doesn't work out in their favor.

No thanks, I'll go with the judicial system the way the founding fathers set it up.

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Well, see, the problem with that is that the "founding fathers" didn't set it up at all. The Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia literally ran out of time, which is why Article III is so short. In essence, they punted the whole matter to Congress.

There is nothing whatsoever at all in the Constitution preventing the party in power (holding both houses of Congress and the Presidency) from increasing the number of judges on the Supreme Court to whatever number required to get whatever result they want.

Of course, the other party would promptly do the same thing and soon as they regained power, and pretty soon the Court is just a bunch of partisan hacks acting as puppets for whoever won the last decisive election.

The above is perfectly Constitutional, and thus the way the "founding fathers set it up" sucks. Try harder.

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Well, see, the founding fathers did set up the judicial branch in the Constitution in Article III regardless of how short the Article might be. While they did give broad lattitude in setting up the lower courts and number of judges, they did address specifically the terms of justices ...

"The Judges, both of the supreme and inferior Courts, shall hold their Offices during good Behaviour..."

Nothing there about limiting the length of the term other than on the basis of behaviour. It was clearly understood that this meant a lifetime appointment so that judges could be insulated from politics.

I never said anything about Congress and the President being able to increase the number of justices. Obviously they can and have in the past, again, Article III gives them that lattitude in setting up the courts.

While the founding fathers were not perfect, they created an amazing document and system of government that has stood the test of time amazingly well considering the changes in our society and culture over 230 years. And it does have provisions for changes through the ammendment process where it may be lacking with broad enough support. Not bad for a group of old white guys. We will have to agree to disagree, Article III while short, certainly does not "suck" as you seem to think.

YokelRidesAgain said:

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Ag87H2O said:

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Just like the Electoral College, the Dems always want to change the rules when it doesn't work out in their favor.

No thanks, I'll go with the judicial system the way the founding fathers set it up.

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Well, see, the problem with that is that the "founding fathers" didn't set it up at all. The Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia literally ran out of time, which is why Article III is so short. In essence, they punted the whole matter to Congress.

There is nothing whatsoever at all in the Constitution preventing the party in power (holding both houses of Congress and the Presidency) from increasing the number of judges on the Supreme Court to whatever number required to get whatever result they want.

Of course, the other party would promptly do the same thing and soon as they regained power, and pretty soon the Court is just a bunch of partisan hacks acting as puppets for whoever won the last decisive election.

The above is perfectly Constitutional, and thus the way the "founding fathers set it up" sucks. Try harder.

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Sounds like a great idea for a Constitutional amendment setting the number of Justices at no more than 9 (or some number). But alas, the populace and its representatives are more worried about stupid **** like fake racism.

Grapesoda2525 said:

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Prognightmare said:

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https://apple.news/AvqrN8mCOSYmAs4KKHhS4XA

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-court-termlimits-idUSKCN26F3L3

Quote:

---

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Democrats in of the House of Representatives will introduce a bill next week to limit the tenure of U.S. Supreme Court justices to 18 years from current lifetime appointments, in a bid to reduce partisan warring over vacancies and preserve the court's legitimacy.

The new bill, seen by Reuters, would allow every president to nominate two justices per four-year term and comes amid heightened political tensions as Republican President Donald Trump prepares to announce his third pick for the Supreme Court after the death on Sept. 18 of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, with just 40 days to go until the Nov. 3 election.

"It would save the country a lot of agony and help lower the temperature over fights for the court that go to the fault lines of cultural issues and is one of the primary things tearing at our social fabric," said California U.S. Representative Ro Khanna, who plans to introduce the legislation on Tuesday, along with Representatives Joe Kennedy III of Massachusetts and Don Beyer of Virginia.

Partly due to rising life expectancies, justices serve increasingly long tenures, on average now more than 25 years.

Term limits for high court justices have for years had support from a number of legal scholars on both the right and the left. Several polls in recent years have also shown large majorities of the American public support term limits.

The bill - the Supreme Court Term Limits and Regular Appointments Act - is the first to try to set Supreme Court term limits by statute, according to Gabe Roth, the executive director of Fix the Court, a judicial transparency group whose campaign for high court term limits has been gaining attention.

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I can agree with this but let's wrap term limits of Congress critters in with it.

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I would definitely sign off / agree on this.

We should also do 10 terms for house members since they only get 2 years per.

4 terms for senators.

Anything else is a bit excessive. We don't need people spending 50+ years in Congress or on the courts.

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Ew. You think we need Reps spending 20 years in office? Cap them at 10 years and Senators at 12.

If they can't do enough good in that time, they can't do enough good.

C@LAg said:

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we need a constitutional convention.

force term limits on the tards. regardless of party.

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Hell.Fuggin.No.

The absolute last thing we need is the current crop of politicians having the power and authority to re-draft the constitution. That is beyond scary.

schmellba99 said:

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C@LAg said:

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we need a constitutional convention.

force term limits on the tards. regardless of party.

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Hell.Fuggin.No.

The absolute last thing we need is the current crop of politicians having the power and authority to re-draft the constitution. That is beyond scary.

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If it's a convention of the states I wouldn't be quite as worried.

The thing that pisses me off the most about this bill is that it is such a waste of time and resources. There are other way more pressing issues than unicorn farts and fairy dust of changing the constitution with legislation only.

I wish there were some lawyers on the Dem side that understood the first thing about the Constitution.

Ag87H2 said:

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While the founding fathers were not perfect, they created an amazing document and system of government that has stood the test of time amazingly well

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Again, no, they didn't.

The "system of government" designed in the original Constitution bears little resemblance to the one that exists now.

Among others:

1) Enacting a process that ignored the existence of political parties (which were certainly a well known phenomenon at the time of the drafting), and the probable development of same in the US, the process for election of the President was doomed to fail. Which it promptly did in 1800, requiring the 12th amendment to correct an elementary error in judgment on the part of the Constitutional Convention.

2) The selection of the Senate and the President by popular vote among the several states, neither of which was in contemplation at the time the Constitution was written

Make it a 12 year limit for every level of politics and I think we're on to something. Career politicians can go F themselves. All of them