Amy Coney Barrett’s majority opinion today as to the permissibility of States counting ballots that are received after Election Day is perfectly reasonable, and well-reasoned.
To answer you very soberly and rationally--I'm very truly on a sadly constrained budget. The teeny handful of Substacks I pay hard money for are because they were true lifelines throughout Our Plague Era and I remain very grateful for that. It was a hard time to live through.
Well, one of them wasn't a lifeline but he very generously comped me a year and I felt honor-bound to pay for a subscription when that year concluded, and considering that he seems to be one of the most slandered guys on social media (and people on social media slander me when I point that out) and is a truly, in my view, extraordinary writer, I feel eating a little less cheddar cheese in order to pay the annual cost is a worthwhile sacrifice.
I do like your writing very much, Michael, and am grateful you allow free readers to comment. May your Substack live long and prosper (though sadly without my monetary contribution).
Roberts is a very savvy political operator and he works hard to make the court appear unbiased. The birthright citizenship decision is about to come down and it looks like it could easily go Trump's way. If the court appears to be partisan towards Trump, the Democrats will scream even louder to pack the court.
Pure nonsense. If we continue on this way you “thoughtful” nuanced liberals will rue the day. Eventually your heads will be on the chopping block, and you will watch the fruits of your hard work being scavenged by the third world while you are called racist for not wanting your daughter raped.
Texas has this law because we take up a gigantic amount of real estate much of which is barely populated. It’s bleedin’ expensive for rural counties to run elections and anything that makes it easier to do that, including mail-in ballots, is a popular policy. There are good liberal reasons to oppose postal ballots — women married to abusive men and dotty elders victimized by caregivers don’t have a genuine secret ballot being one big one — and conservative reasons to support them. Because Trump is the only person allowed to have an opinion in the Republican Party, his myrmidumbs mindless repeat his objections and we can’t have a decent discussion on the subject. (Trump himself used a mail-in ballot)
Ok, I found this SCOTUS decision a nothing burger because it doesn’t address who has the right to vote. If only US citizens have the right to vote, then tailoring mail in ballots isn’t such a big deal. But that issue (who has the right to vote) is not on the table so I cannot argue with Barrett’s analysis. So, who has the right to vote in elections for local, state and federal positions? I thought the Constitution was pretty clear on that. And, no, noncitizen’s don’t get a vote. So how do we ensure who is a citizen, could that be positive ID? I think maybe that’s a good start.
Alito's sensible dissent made the case for an election day, not an election month. This wasn't a Republican play to deny people their vote.
“The acceptance of these late-arriving ballots effectively postpones the date on which the electorate’s choice is made, and federal law precludes that postponement,” he wrote. “Election day is a specified date, not a span of multiple days.”
Alito said that “two centuries of historical practice” reinforce his arguments. “From this country’s founding until the late 20th century, election-day ballot collection was the near-uniform practice, with only a few late-arriving exceptions.”
Alito made a case that all states should be barred, by federal dictate, from accepting the receipt of ballots which arrive at any time after Election Day in November. The case pertained to the state law of Mississippi. The idea that the GOP-controlled state legislature and GOP governor near-unanimously enacted a law creating an “Election Month” in Mississippi, because the law allows for ballots postmarked by Election Day to be counted if received within five business days, is absurd. Alito also glosses over the abundant historical precedent for counting ballots received after Election Day, namely overseas and military ballots in both World Wars. He argues that his own judicially-decreed views on the proper limitations of “Election Day” should override the ordinary political process undertaken in Mississippi and other states, and a uniform federal dictate should instead be imposed, which would have rendered invalid countless state election laws and procedures going back well over a century.
Michael--off topic: I just had to chastise an AI search engine for conflating you with Michael Tracy who has been in a long-running feud with Jon Krakauer re "Into Thin Air." The AI apologized but you may want to keep an eye on it.
The fact that the decision 5-4 is scary. America was inches away from a massive political upheaval! Right-wing judges end up being the most inconsistent, the same people who purpotedly defend so-called « states’ rights » are now defending an ever-expanding federql overreach in any field.
(Updated response, see sentence with boldface portion)
Thanks Michael Tracey. You wrote the article well but I must more or less disagree, having said that you did lay a clear framework for this discussion:
It makes no difference to me whether The President is elected by electoral college or popular vote. If those are the rules, then those are the rules.
Both State and Federal Elections should be postmarked by election day(what Louisiana has is preposterous) and can be received on a set number of days later(the actual number is not too important, just that it's consistent). Of course, it should allocate plenty of time left on the shot clock for those postmarked votes by election day to be counted. This should be across the board. Now there may be some differences in the size of jurisdictions and states for mail to be received(with the assumption not everyone is voting by internet), if the Supreme Court wants to pro-rate the distance factor(that is larger than an average size) plus the standardized number of days after postmarked ballot to be counted than that is, I guess, fine.
Let’s stop being naive here. The three ideological justices know why they voted the way they did. As for ACB, she should have taken one look at what just happened in the dem primary in LA and figured out her “cogent” argument was foolishly naive.
The most sober and rational piece I've ever read from you.
Hardly any fun at all!
I'm honored. You should upgrade to a paid subscription if I've bestowed you with such pristinely rational insights. Just sayin'!
To answer you very soberly and rationally--I'm very truly on a sadly constrained budget. The teeny handful of Substacks I pay hard money for are because they were true lifelines throughout Our Plague Era and I remain very grateful for that. It was a hard time to live through.
Well, one of them wasn't a lifeline but he very generously comped me a year and I felt honor-bound to pay for a subscription when that year concluded, and considering that he seems to be one of the most slandered guys on social media (and people on social media slander me when I point that out) and is a truly, in my view, extraordinary writer, I feel eating a little less cheddar cheese in order to pay the annual cost is a worthwhile sacrifice.
I do like your writing very much, Michael, and am grateful you allow free readers to comment. May your Substack live long and prosper (though sadly without my monetary contribution).
He does write well.
Who’s being slandered? All three of your pace subscriptions are people who write under aliases. Can’t really slander someone who’s under an alias.
I have more paid subscriptions than that!
OK, but your profile shows the bad cat,Eppigius and simulator only. I’m just being nosy. Who’s the heavily slander person?
I don't know why he's not listed on my profile's subscription list. I just checked my receipts and it's active.
Actually, I see now, one founding membership to simulator, two paid memberships and one hidden or private
Are you sayin I could be reading this stack for free?
Dang.
Roberts is a very savvy political operator and he works hard to make the court appear unbiased. The birthright citizenship decision is about to come down and it looks like it could easily go Trump's way. If the court appears to be partisan towards Trump, the Democrats will scream even louder to pack the court.
Nope.
Now, unlike just about every other nation on the planet, a foreign woman can waddle across the border and give birth to another brand new US citizen.
Easy peasy!
Weird decision and obviously against the intent of the amendment.So much for my predictive abilities!
I don't understand how something mailed in Mississippi could take 5 days to arrive at another address in Mississippi, but okay.
I still wonder why my state (Arizona) now takes 10 days to count the votes, after mailing ballots to everyone, whether requested or not.
Pure nonsense. If we continue on this way you “thoughtful” nuanced liberals will rue the day. Eventually your heads will be on the chopping block, and you will watch the fruits of your hard work being scavenged by the third world while you are called racist for not wanting your daughter raped.
Pretty amazing that all of Trump's first term appointments are far less insane than the likes of Alito, Roberts and of course Thomas.
I remember the confirmation hearings, they were apocalyptic in their tone, warning of a "handmaids tale" future for America.
Glad to hear MT cutting through the partisan horseshit on this
Texas has this law because we take up a gigantic amount of real estate much of which is barely populated. It’s bleedin’ expensive for rural counties to run elections and anything that makes it easier to do that, including mail-in ballots, is a popular policy. There are good liberal reasons to oppose postal ballots — women married to abusive men and dotty elders victimized by caregivers don’t have a genuine secret ballot being one big one — and conservative reasons to support them. Because Trump is the only person allowed to have an opinion in the Republican Party, his myrmidumbs mindless repeat his objections and we can’t have a decent discussion on the subject. (Trump himself used a mail-in ballot)
Ok, I found this SCOTUS decision a nothing burger because it doesn’t address who has the right to vote. If only US citizens have the right to vote, then tailoring mail in ballots isn’t such a big deal. But that issue (who has the right to vote) is not on the table so I cannot argue with Barrett’s analysis. So, who has the right to vote in elections for local, state and federal positions? I thought the Constitution was pretty clear on that. And, no, noncitizen’s don’t get a vote. So how do we ensure who is a citizen, could that be positive ID? I think maybe that’s a good start.
You must be racist.
*wink*
Alito's sensible dissent made the case for an election day, not an election month. This wasn't a Republican play to deny people their vote.
“The acceptance of these late-arriving ballots effectively postpones the date on which the electorate’s choice is made, and federal law precludes that postponement,” he wrote. “Election day is a specified date, not a span of multiple days.”
Alito said that “two centuries of historical practice” reinforce his arguments. “From this country’s founding until the late 20th century, election-day ballot collection was the near-uniform practice, with only a few late-arriving exceptions.”
Alito made a case that all states should be barred, by federal dictate, from accepting the receipt of ballots which arrive at any time after Election Day in November. The case pertained to the state law of Mississippi. The idea that the GOP-controlled state legislature and GOP governor near-unanimously enacted a law creating an “Election Month” in Mississippi, because the law allows for ballots postmarked by Election Day to be counted if received within five business days, is absurd. Alito also glosses over the abundant historical precedent for counting ballots received after Election Day, namely overseas and military ballots in both World Wars. He argues that his own judicially-decreed views on the proper limitations of “Election Day” should override the ordinary political process undertaken in Mississippi and other states, and a uniform federal dictate should instead be imposed, which would have rendered invalid countless state election laws and procedures going back well over a century.
Now I’ll bet you're one of the people who raged against Trump for fixing the Supreme Court in his favor. Am I right?
I'll bet you're a big dummy: https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!gx27!,w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F36b4d98b-9f7f-413f-883d-6dd0693d5c06_1320x640.png
In the words of Calvin Coolidge, “You lose.”
In the words of Calvin Coolidge, “You lose.” However, I'm delighted to hear I lost my bet too.
Bullshit.
Solid counter-argument.
MT not defending pedos....?? Was ACB on Epstein island ??
Michael--off topic: I just had to chastise an AI search engine for conflating you with Michael Tracy who has been in a long-running feud with Jon Krakauer re "Into Thin Air." The AI apologized but you may want to keep an eye on it.
Wrong , Justice Thomas got it right using history. Tired of rulings coming from the Pope
He also put his status of American Freedmen and our country first. His faith didn’t sway his decision. Do you know his relationship with the church ?
The fact that the decision 5-4 is scary. America was inches away from a massive political upheaval! Right-wing judges end up being the most inconsistent, the same people who purpotedly defend so-called « states’ rights » are now defending an ever-expanding federql overreach in any field.
(Updated response, see sentence with boldface portion)
Thanks Michael Tracey. You wrote the article well but I must more or less disagree, having said that you did lay a clear framework for this discussion:
It makes no difference to me whether The President is elected by electoral college or popular vote. If those are the rules, then those are the rules.
Both State and Federal Elections should be postmarked by election day(what Louisiana has is preposterous) and can be received on a set number of days later(the actual number is not too important, just that it's consistent). Of course, it should allocate plenty of time left on the shot clock for those postmarked votes by election day to be counted. This should be across the board. Now there may be some differences in the size of jurisdictions and states for mail to be received(with the assumption not everyone is voting by internet), if the Supreme Court wants to pro-rate the distance factor(that is larger than an average size) plus the standardized number of days after postmarked ballot to be counted than that is, I guess, fine.
Let’s stop being naive here. The three ideological justices know why they voted the way they did. As for ACB, she should have taken one look at what just happened in the dem primary in LA and figured out her “cogent” argument was foolishly naive.