The Supreme Court & the Death of the Rule of Law

 The United States invented the Rule of Law through the fragmentation of sovereignty among 51 sovereign authorities each with three branches of government. It further protects individual rights from state and federal infringement. This effectively created a legal system that could all state actors to account before law. While still imperfect in many important ways, Donald Trump took a sledgehammer to the Rule of Law particularly since January 6, 2021.

Today in America the rule of law faces severe challenges and may well face a total sunset. If so, the Supreme Court of the United States played a central role as accomplice. Most notably, today granted review (certiorari) on the following question: Whether and if so to what extent does a former President enjoy presidential immunity from criminal prosecution for conduct alleged to involve official acts during his tenure in office. That question in the abstract may hold academic interest, but the answer lies in many disputes in the future over decades or even centuries. 

Prof. Laurence Tribe, a legendary Constitutional Law scholar, explains the effect of this action:

The Supreme Court effectively gives Trump the potential to now escape any accountability for his role in the insurrection of January 6, 2021. This order puts partisan politics above the Rule of Law. A very dark day for America.

Fascism Rising & the Burning of the Reichstag: February 27, 1933

 

Fascism means an extreme concentration of power in one person who thereby rises above the law. Such irrational power concentration always arises from lies, delusions and hatred--such as racism. It always leads to violence, bloodshed and war. From its origins in Italy after World War I through today as manifest in Donald Trump, and his comrades in arms, Vladimir Putin, Kim Jong Un and Xi Jinping, it always fails and leads to destruction and mass death. Human rights violations and oppression universally accompany fascism. Even a cursory review of history reveals that fascism entails pain, misery, and mass murder. Yet, fascism rises across the world and even in America. Tuesday, November 5, 2024, will determine whether fascism will march forward in the world or fail to overcome the freedom, prosperity and determination of the West. I will chronicle this contest here.

Along the way we will explore the history of fascism and its manifold failures. Fittingly,    today coincides with the 91st anniversary of the Burning of the Reichstag. This event launched Adolph Hitler toward totalitarian dictator. The next day the German President Paul von Hindenburg suspended civil liberties. Opposition to Nazis effectively became a crime. Today, controversy surrounds the Burning of the Reichstag. The new consensus in Berlin holds that the Nazis did it. In any event, it became a Big Lie that supported the onset of fascism in Germany. Things did not end well for the German people nor the wider world--over 8 million Germans perished.

Donald Trump already called for the suspension of the Constitution so that he may seize power. He promises to be a "dictator" on day one of his new administration. He claims power to override the Constitution via executive order--the first President to ever make such an outlandish claim. Trump will never concede defeat and acquiesce in the peaceful transition of power as he proved on January 6, 2020 when he led an insurrection rather than concede defeat. 

Trump proved he will never consent to the peaceful transition of power. Which is why his admission that he seeks to exercise dictatorial power on day one of his new administration should he win the election must be taken seriously:

It is hard to imagine a more clear and present danger to our Constitutional Republic than Trump's own admission that he seeks dictatorial power.