Opus 2017-027: A Supreme Court Perspective

What kind of changes will Donald Trump bring about in how we do business in Washington.  We tend to live in today and lose the perspective of history.  We think big changes have never been done before.  I came across the plan of Thomas Jefferson while reading a book about John Marshall.  Jefferson is the father of the Democratic party.  The current party is the direct descendant of the group he brought together.  It was originally the Democrat-Republican party and later dropped the Republican but in this quote when you read Republican understand that it is talking about the historic Democratic party. 

See what Jefferson had planned for the Supreme Court.

“‘The Federalists,’ wrote Jefferson, ‘have retired into the judiciary as a stronghold ... and from that battery all the works of republicanism are to be beaten down and erased.’  Therefore that stronghold must be taken. Never was a military plan more carefully devised than was the Republican method of capturing it. Jefferson would forthwith remove all Federalist United States marshals and attorneys; he would get rid of the National judges whom Adams had appointed under the Judiciary Act of 1801.  If this did not make those who remained on the National Bench sufficiently tractable, the sword of impeachment would be held over their obstinate heads until terror of removal and disgrace should render them pliable to the dominant political will. Thus by progressive stages the Supreme Court would be brought beneath the blade of the executioner and the obnoxious Marshall decapitated or compelled to submit.”

This is playing hardball.  I have heard nothing to compare with it in my lifetime.  There is little that Trump could do that would even come close to the precedent established by Thomas Jefferson.  Later he will try to railroad a Federalist justice with impeachment.

We live in boring times.  Grab hold and hang on for the ride.

Albert J. Beveridge.  The Life of John Marshall (Volume 3 of 4) Kindle Location
      555-563, from Gutenberg Project download.

homo unius libri