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Notes -
Trump case out on him being an insurrectionists.
https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/23pdf/23-719_19m2.pdf
Compared to the Reddit debates and how the SC would prevent this as a non-lawyer I thought the opinion was fairly basic and simple. It seems to me that they just declared it a Feds power in Federal elections and the States don’t get a say. Personally, I did come to a belief that it was self-executing.
I think they avoided really touching on all the novel legal theories both ways going around on Reddit or twitter.
It came down to what I believe was one of my original views that letting States have any say in declaring someone an insurrectionists would be a complete clusterfuck and basically turn into state legislatures electing Presidents. Therefore they declared it a federal power.
I would call this pragmatic versus legally correct in my opinion. They avoided 100 page treatise on whether the President is an office holder.
I predicted something between 7-2 and 9-0. 9-0 seems better for the nation.
It will also be interesting to see what happens to Couy Griffin (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/feb/17/new-mexico-insurrectionist-fourteenth-amendment). I think these courts making 14th amendment decisions are screwed up. If there is either federal or state law that makes certain things a crime and punishment for that crime is that you lose the ability to hold office then I think that's fine. But courts making these decisions without a proper criminal trial with the opportunity for a jury and proper standards of evidence is broken. If you have a friendly judge you can basically remove someone from office for attending a protest where they have committed trespassing crimes.
Couy Griffin was a state official, so Anderson's "We conclude that States may disqualify persons holding or attempting to hold state office." seems pretty clear. It's possible he'll get looked at closer for other reasons, but he seems like the sort of case this court punts on.
I think if they had to make a decision they would side with Griffin.
Something feels off to me with “He’s unqualified for his State/local office because he’s an insurrectionists but he’s qualified to be a Senator because he’s not an insurrectionists”
I think to kick him out for being an insurrectionists he would need to violate a state law of insurrection.
This was my issue with a lot of arguments for disqualification since it doesn’t make sense to me someone can be guilty and innocent at the same time.
That's emphatically not what they are saying. They are saying that
The fact that two branches of our government might come to different conclusions about the object level for a particular candidate is a feature not a bug.
Except we live in a Democracy. One person/group wrote the word “Insurrection” and one group of people voted on the word “Insurrection”. It therefore must have only one meaning by the people who wrote and voted on it.
As voted on it can only have one meaning. If today the definition of Insurrection has an interpretation by the Feds and an interpretation by Colorado it means there are now two definitions of Insurrection. But the word could only have 1 meaning as voted on. If you now have 2 meanings but when passed you had 1 meaning it now means one of the 2 current meanings is an imposter and was never Democratically voted on and therefore is NOT law.
Now if Colorado passed a law that no Insurrectionists can hold office and the Feds passed the 14th Amendment then you would have 2 definitions of insurrection that were passed thru a Democratic process. You could have a definition of Insurrection according to the Colorado state legislature and a definition of Insurrection as passed thru the US amendment process.
This is the core of the rule of law in a Democracy. A word must have a defined meaning as it is voted on. If the meaning of words can change then that means laws as used were never voted on. You would now be implementing laws that were never voted on.
I have no problem with States and Feds having different powers and the ability to govern issues separately within their jurisdiction. Democracy though requires voting on laws. When only one law was passed but two laws are being implemented it means that one of the laws was never voted on. 2 does not equal 1.
2 bills being passed and 2 laws being implemented would be fine since 2 does in fact equal 2.
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You're absolutely right that this creates the silly situation where he is disqualified from being a county commissioner but not from being a Senator. Such is life. The court decided that this was the absurdity they could live with.
But also note that it's not that he can be a Senator because he's innocent. It's that he can't be disqualified without enabling federal legislation, no matter if he's guilty.
Can you explain what you think is absurd or incoherent about it? The United States has an expressly and explicitly federal structure, and this isn't a new or unusual development - it has literally been this way since even the Articles of Confederation. The individual States retain their general police powers and can legislate regarding their own offices as they see fit, including (but not limited to) offices of their own sub-political units (like counties). In what way is that incoherent with respect to whether or not they are permitted to set requirements for expressly and explicitly Federal government positions?
This and some of your other comments lead me to believe you are not familiar with the subtleties of the political structure of the United States, and especially not with the jurisprudence regarding the intersections and resolution of conflicts between State and Federal law (e.g., your comment below about state courts not being allowed to enforce the 14th Amendment - the 14th Amendment is a part of the Federal Constitution, so although a state court might apply it, that application could and would be reviewed by the appropriate Federal court for that political subdivision to make sure the state court decision comports with the Federal Court precedent on that Amendment). If it isn't overly personally identifying, can you give some background here to understand where you're coming from? It might help me respond more usefully.
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The court expressly states in the opinion that states have the power to disqualify candidates from state office.
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I think it's less a difference about qualification and more that it's the state deciding a state(or smaller) level matter versus a state deciding a federal matter. Though I do tend to agree an actual conviction on insurrection should be needed when it is as unclear as it is with the Capitol Riot. Certainly less obvious than the Civil War.
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