The Supreme Court faces criticism for its role in making American governance increasingly difficult through controversial legal doctrines and partisan shifts.
Even then, you might be out of luck.. The Supreme Court has spent the last twenty years making America nearly ungovernable.. This trend can also be traced to the court’s self-aggrandizement, particularly when it comes to Democratic presidents.. Thanks to the court’s embrace of partisan gerrymandering since 2019, most Americans no longer live in competitive House districts.. The lawmakers who are elected are increasingly extreme figures who can pass purity tests in primary elections, where
any remaining competitiveness takes place.. Combined with the gutting of campaign-finance laws, lawmakers—and particularly GOP lawmakers—are beholden not to the voters, but to well-funded special interests who can tip a primary race (early and often) one way or the other with superPAC money.. Congressional dysfunction is not entirely the Supreme Court’s fault, but they have made it nearly impossible to fix.. Even if Congress were more functional, the Supreme Court has given itself free rein
to second-guess the legislative branch’s judgment and discretion.. The major-questions doctrine mainly curbs executive policymaking, but it also substantively narrows Congress’s power as well.. To survive its vague and subjective terms, lawmakers must pass new laws for new circumstances instead of allowing existing laws to be applied in novel ways.. The Supreme Court has only ever applied this doctrine to Democratic presidents; half of them refused to use it to strike down Trump’s tariffs despite
the clear opportunity to do so.. Take, for example, how Justice Samuel Alito wrote about the Clean Water Act in a 2023 case.. Congress enacted the CWA to clean up pollution in the nation’s waterways and protect them from further despoiling.. It was the will of the American people, expressed through their legislature, that these waterways be protected.. Congress has not repealed the CWA or amended its scope more narrowly.. Alito, however, thought differently.. The
law, he complained, imposed “crushing consequences” on “property owners” for often “mundane” violations like “moving dirt.”