Courts and State-Controlled Federal Elections

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In Moore v Harper, the Supreme Court is being called on to decide whether State courts can rearrange State elections laws—in particular, write their own Congressional district maps—as these pertain to how a State runs Federal-level elections.

It shouldn’t even be a question. Our Constitution is quite clear on the matter of who is responsible for setting the rules for Federal elections. Here’s Article I, Section 4:

The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof….

And only the Federal Congress can adjust those Times, Places and Manner. Not State courts, not even Federal courts.

Our Constitution and every State constitution also is clear on the place and role of the court system in our Federal and State governments. The Judiciary branches are coequal with the Legislature and Executive Branches—neither subordinate nor superior to either. Especially, the Judiciary branches are separate from the other two branches; they are not additional legislative facilities.

State courts, including State Supreme Courts, the facility at proximate case in Moore, have no role in setting or adjusting State Legislature-written Federal-level election rules for their States.

One argument that is being pushed on the Supreme Court for allowing State courts to overrule State Legislatures is “the Founders couldn’t possibly have meant no court oversight of State election laws.” This is obviously inaccurate. In the first place, what the Founders meant in our Constitution is what they actually wrote down and passed out of Convention to submit to the people to ratify.

In the second place, what We the People meant when we ratified that Constitution is that written-down, passed out of Convention, Constitution, with a single modification by us. The Federalist and Anti-Federalist debate, which involved a number of folks in We the People, resulted in a commitment to pass Amendments comprising what came to be called the Bill of Rights—the first 10 Amendments—and We the People ratified those Amendments promptly out of the First Congress. None of those Amendments address in any way how an individual State conducts its Federal-level elections.

No court oversight State election laws is precisely what the Founders intended, and it’s exactly the intention of We the People.

Full stop.

Supporting Ukraine’s Ability “to defend themselves”

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Against the backdrop of three probably Ukrainian attacks on Russian defense facilities well inside Russia, Secretary of State Antony Blinken “assured” one and all that

the US was determined to make sure the Ukrainians had “the equipment that they need to defend themselves, to defend their territory, to defend their freedom.”

That is, to use the technical term, a crock from the Biden administration.

A Critical Item in defending themselves, defending their territory, defending their freedom is a Ukrainian ability to attack the barbarian’s launching sites, including those inside Russia proper, that the barbarian uses for the missiles and drones being fired on civilian targets like apartment buildings; hospitals; and electricity, natural gas, and water distribution nodes.

Yet this administration demurs from facilitating Ukraine’s ability to do that. It has supplied Ukraine with HIMARS crippleware, artificially modified to prevent those systems from firing into Russia, it continues to block delivery of fighter aircraft, and it continues to jawbone Ukraine against attacking into Russia.

What the Biden administration also continues to do is refuse to explain why Russia should be a sanctuary state, even as it prosecutes its barbaric war against Ukraine.

Economic Failure

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An example is in the housing market, provided by this bit in a Wall Street Journal article centered on housing costs as a major component of our current economic inflation. The article suggests, among other things, that housing cost inflation may be abating.

If shelter inflation does drag overall inflation closer to 2%, that doesn’t mean the inflation problem is over. Economists assume increases in rents and home prices will remain subdued, given the slowing economy and high mortgage rates.

Say that the shelter inflation is easing and that it does, indeed, drag overall inflation down. Inflation is a measure of the rate of price increases, it is not a measure of prices themselves. If shelter prices stop rising so fast, the cost of shelter—rent, house purchase (and associated interest rates on those mortgage), rent/housing utilities—and of fuel, food, and on and on all will remain at their current levels; they most assuredly will not fall back.

But those prices must be paid out of a household’s income, and that income—wages and salaries—has increased only at half to three-quarters the rate of inflation. That means that in real, practical, terms, a household has less money with which to pay those costs: a larger per centage of monthly household income will be absorbed by those monthly rent/mortgage payments and those monthly household utility, fuel, food, etc bills than was the case before this inflation explosion.

That’s the failure of the Biden administration’s and Congress’ fiscal policy of throwing trillions of dollars at our economy with no means for it to absorb that money though increased production and productivity. That failure is exacerbated by the Powell Federal Reserve’s monetary policy failure in artificially suppressing interest rates for so long, and in printing dollars like the presses would run out of ink tomorrow through its bottomless purchases of Treasury debt instruments.

Shouldn’t Be Anyway

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In a Fox News piece on the refusal of Russia to continue negotiations on the mutual inspection clause of the current New START treaty that purports to limit the size of the Russian and American nuclear arsenals, there was this from Arms Control Association Executive Director Daryl Kimball regarding the breakdown:

If there’s not a negotiation on some sort of replacement treaty, there will be no agreement for the first time since 1972 that limits the world’s two largest nuclear superpowers arsenals[.]

Kimball is ignoring—worse, President Joe Biden (D), his Secretary of State, and his Secretary of Defense are ignoring—the absence of the world’s third largest nuclear superpower in any sort of nuclear arms control negotiation.

If the People’s Republic of China, which is expanding its nuclear arsenal and modernizing with state-of-the-art equipment its delivery systems for that arsenal, is not an active and good faith participant in any such negotiation, than any arms limitation treaty between the US and Russia will amount only to the US’ unilateral disarmament relative to the PRC—and relative to Russia, which is rapidly becoming economically dependent on the PRC and which can rely on it in any nuclear war.

That growing disparity in military capability between the US and the PRC, keep in mind, comes against the backdrop of PRC President Xi Jinping’s avowed goal of “supplanting” the US as the sole world power.

We need to accept Russia’s decision, via its current refusal, to begin a new arms race. It’s a race that our survival as a free and independent actor in the world depends on winning, and it’s a race that we can win with our—so far—economic and technological superiority, just as we did vis-à-vis the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.

The time is now, though, to join and to push that race—the PRC already has been in it for lots of years, and that nation is far more economically and technologically capable than the USSR ever was.

Voting as a Teaching Tool

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The Boston City Council has approved a petition to allow 16- and 17-year-olds to vote in city elections. The city council’s next move is to submit its petition to the Massachusetts legislature for enactment. It’s the council’s rationalization for the move that’s instructive.

Progressive members of the City Council argued that lowering the voting age would help young people build a habit of voting and make them more likely to continue being politically engaged later in life.

And this:

When it comes to making a decision as to who’s going to represent them [16- and 17-year-olds], that has been denied to them.

This, especially, is egregiously misleading. Those children have parents representing them. Those parents vote. Those parents are the source of instruction.

Never mind, though. Voting isn’t important in choosing our political leaders. Nobody teaches American history in grade school anymore, apparently, or Civics in junior high, or Western Civilization at any age. No, voting has no importance beyond teaching children a measure of responsibility, because schools also seem to lack any other tools for teaching them ethics (Aristotle, anyone?) or morality (Aesop, or religion, maybe?).

Sure.