The Supreme’s have the case of can ex-President Donald Trump be kicked of the voting ballots in a state, Colorado, due his actions to have the 2020 electoral vote NOT certified?
The amendment was put into place to lock out Civil War official’s that working against the Union side (US Constitution, NOT the Confederate one) being able to gain office once the conflict was over….
The members of High Court will have to decide the perimeters of what their decision will deal with…
So?
If Donald Trump, an ex-President (A officer in the laws description?) did try contest the US Constitution’s rules for an election?
Was THAT an ‘insurrection‘ that meet the amendments standards?
This decision would actually have the 9 Supreme’s deciding an election, something most legal experts feel the court’s justices will try HARD to AVOILD…
(I’m NO Lawyer)
The Law…
Here’s the full text:
“No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.”
Quite a mouthful, right? Let’s simplify. Here’s a streamlined version of the clause with only the most relevant parts highlighted:
“No person shall … hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, … who, having previously taken an oath, … as an officer of the United States, … to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same …”
The justices are sure to delve into the precise meaning of those pivotal phrases. For example:
- Was the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol an “insurrection”? If not, the insurrection clause doesn’t apply.
- Even if Jan. 6 was an insurrection, did Trump “engage” in it? If not, he is eligible to hold office again.
- When Trump took his oath of office as president, did he take that oath as “officer of the United States”? If not, the disqualification provision does not apply to him…..
Update….
The consensus from legal expert’s is that the court will NOT allow separate states to disallow a person reunning for PRESIDENT ….
This would be ducking the question of ‘insurrection‘….
I’m NO lawyer….
But I did guess this when I first posted this piece….
Trump likely to get over….
During Shannon Stevenson’s turn at the lectern, the justices continued to voice grave concerns about a patchwork of state decisions on whether a candidate can be disqualified. Both Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Amy Coney Barrett returned to this theme. It’s another signal that the court is skeptical of the idea that states have broad authority to enforce the insurrection clause on their own….
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A lot of skepticism from even the liberal justices on this challenge, from many angles. Here’s Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson: “Why didn’t they put the word president in the very enumerated list in section three? The thing that really is troubling to me is I totally understand your argument, but they were listing people that were barred, and president is not there.” A lot of the pushback from the justices has been on individual states making a disqualification call, but it is beyond that….
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“Why should a single state have the ability to make this determination, not only for their own citizens, but for the rest of the nation?”
Justice Elena Kagan
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Roberts said states could adopt different standards, relying on disparate evidence, to remove various candidates from the ballot. Justice Samuel Alito asked whether military commanders could disobey orders from a commander-in-chief the moment they determined that a president engaged in an insurrection.
“I would expect that a goodly number of states will say: ‘Whoever the Democratic candidate is, you’re off the ballot,’” Roberts said. “That’s a pretty daunting consequence.”
The odds seemed stacked against the challengers even before the hearing began, with legal experts anticipating hostility from the justices that cut across partisan lines. Thursday’s questioning seemed to confirm that view.
Not only were conservative justices sharply critical, the court’s liberal justices also worried aloud about the impact of the ruling….
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image….Bloomberg