A bad grade that changed the U.S. constitution (2017) • Hacker News Board

Re: A bad grade that changed the U.S. constitution (2017)

#11

Post by resoluteteeth » Thu, Aug 05, 2021, 1:01 AM UTC

jawns wrote: post #2

There have been only two amendments to the U.S. Constitution over the past 50+ years (one of which is the subject of this story). Why? Partly because the Supreme Court has been very willing to discover hidden rights within the existing amendments, decreasing the need for states to go through the very arduous process of getting a new amendment over the finish line. That might seem like a fine way to handle things ...…

If interpreted strictly, the constitution is really not suitable for operating a modern government (e.g. if you interpret the list of powers given to the federal government narrowly) so the supreme court essentially has no choice but to make stuff up.

Obviously once they start doing that there's no real way to control what they are able to modify, but the only real way to fix it would be to completely scrap the current constitution and start from scratch (and be much more explicit about everything including rights and constitutional review). However,the constitution is now seen as something like infallible scripture in the US, plus it's impossible to get everyone to agree on anything, so that would be highly unlikely in the near future even though other to countries have been able to do it.

Re: A bad grade that changed the U.S. constitution (2017)

#12

Post by jessaustin » Thu, Aug 05, 2021, 1:05 AM UTC

Aperocky wrote: post #7

jessaustin wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Supreme Court has been making shit up since 1857 at the latest. They are likely to continue to make shit up for several years after the Union dissolves.

Similar to how the Roman Senate existed for more than a century after the fall of Rome.

"...the first time as tragedy, the second time as farce."

Re: A bad grade that changed the U.S. constitution (2017)

#13

Post by hoten » Thu, Aug 05, 2021, 1:06 AM UTC

Aperocky wrote: post #7

jessaustin wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Supreme Court has been making shit up since 1857 at the latest. They are likely to continue to make shit up for several years after the Union dissolves.

Similar to how the Roman Senate existed for more than a century after the fall of Rome.

The Roman Senate was more of a social club for at least few hundreds years prior to that. You could argue it hardly existed before the fall, except in name (losing mostly all authority when Rome transitioned from a republic to an empire).

It's pretty amusing to imagine a future with a failed-US, and how existing institutions might outlive the country. I wonder if there's been any good books using that idea?

Re: A bad grade that changed the U.S. constitution (2017)

#14

Post by hvdijk » Thu, Aug 05, 2021, 1:07 AM UTC

ohazi wrote: post #4

Catch-22: After he got the amendment ratified, there's a strong argument that the paper probably should have been given a higher grade. But had he been given that higher grade in the first place, he probably wouldn't have gone through the effort to ratify the amendment. You could argue that the paper did deserve the initial C grade, because that's what it took to get him angry enough to go and get the amendment ratif…

Poor grades are supposed to be for poor work. What you're talking about is intentionally giving good students bad grades for good work just to piss them off, hoping that something good comes out of pissing them off. That's not what grades are for.

Re: A bad grade that changed the U.S. constitution (2017)

#15

Post by JetAlone » Thu, Aug 05, 2021, 1:08 AM UTC

ohazi wrote: post #4

Catch-22: After he got the amendment ratified, there's a strong argument that the paper probably should have been given a higher grade. But had he been given that higher grade in the first place, he probably wouldn't have gone through the effort to ratify the amendment. You could argue that the paper did deserve the initial C grade, because that's what it took to get him angry enough to go and get the amendment ratif…

Yes, I'd say that the C was providential.

Re: A bad grade that changed the U.S. constitution (2017)

#16

Post by gpm » Thu, Aug 05, 2021, 1:09 AM UTC

Aperocky wrote: post #7

jessaustin wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Supreme Court has been making shit up since 1857 at the latest. They are likely to continue to make shit up for several years after the Union dissolves.

Similar to how the Roman Senate existed for more than a century after the fall of Rome.

Eh, the Eastern Roman Senate ceased existing sometime in the 13 or 14th century, while the Eastern Roman Empire lasted up to 1453, so if we take a bit of a more expansive view on what Rome is than "the western half because that's the half closer to western historians" the senate fell first.

Re: A bad grade that changed the U.S. constitution (2017)

#17

Post by tedivm » Thu, Aug 05, 2021, 1:09 AM UTC

BuyMyBitcoins wrote: post #5

dimitrios1 wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Discover hidden rights is quite the euphemism for legislating from the bench. But credit is due for the correct answer, which is returning the balance back to the legislative branch.

Is the 14th Amendment really written in such a way that you can justify just about anything with it? I swear most SCOTUS landmark cases end up being about the 14th. Especially those considered “legislating from the bench”.

The 14th amendment is pretty open when it comes to granting freedom and not allowing discrimination.

> No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

Re: A bad grade that changed the U.S. constitution (2017)

#18

Post by stormbrew » Thu, Aug 05, 2021, 1:11 AM UTC

jawns wrote: post #2

There have been only two amendments to the U.S. Constitution over the past 50+ years (one of which is the subject of this story). Why? Partly because the Supreme Court has been very willing to discover hidden rights within the existing amendments, decreasing the need for states to go through the very arduous process of getting a new amendment over the finish line. That might seem like a fine way to handle things ...…

> Why? Partly because the Supreme Court has been very willing to discover hidden rights within the existing amendments, decreasing the need for states to go through the very arduous process of getting a new amendment over the finish line.

It seems far more likely to me that the arrow of causality goes the other way here, and that the actual difficulty of passing amendments has just gone up in proportion to the number of states admitted and the progressively worsening lack of proportionality of American legislative bodies making them more and more out of tune with what people actually want in their government.

Certainly it's not inherently "good" for law to come from the bench in itself, but it seems likely enough that the US would have fallen apart long ago without it happening.

Re: A bad grade that changed the U.S. constitution (2017)

#19

Post by rcollyer » Thu, Aug 05, 2021, 1:17 AM UTC

jawns wrote: post #2

There have been only two amendments to the U.S. Constitution over the past 50+ years (one of which is the subject of this story). Why? Partly because the Supreme Court has been very willing to discover hidden rights within the existing amendments, decreasing the need for states to go through the very arduous process of getting a new amendment over the finish line. That might seem like a fine way to handle things ...…

You're ignoring the 9th amendment: "The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people." Essentially, the bill of rights was not intended to be exhaustive, nor could it be.

Re: A bad grade that changed the U.S. constitution (2017)

#20

Post by paxys » Thu, Aug 05, 2021, 1:19 AM UTC

ohazi wrote: post #4

Catch-22: After he got the amendment ratified, there's a strong argument that the paper probably should have been given a higher grade. But had he been given that higher grade in the first place, he probably wouldn't have gone through the effort to ratify the amendment. You could argue that the paper did deserve the initial C grade, because that's what it took to get him angry enough to go and get the amendment ratif…

Maybe the paper did deserve a C when it was handed in. Maybe it was poorly written, too short, too long, irrelevant to the topic at hand or just about anything else.