Supreme Court rules ex-presidents have immunity for official acts • Hacker News Board

Re: Supreme Court rules ex-presidents have immunity for official acts

#721

Post by HaZeust » Mon, Jul 01, 2024, 9:56 PM UTC

selimthegrim wrote: post #702

rayiner wrote: post #654

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’d be okay with that, but only if we have a review process where all Warren Court decisions are re-vetted by the newly constituted Supreme Court. You can’t spend half the 20th century having “judicial oligarchs” rewrite the constitution and then complain when a few court decisions go the other way. But what would be more fun is for the current Supreme Court to adopt the “emanations from penumbras” philosophy of judg…

Why stop there? Why not go back to Lochner?

Lochner made it impossible for the legal pragmatic of our country's ontology to recognize corporations and enterprises as autonomous entities that should have checks and balances for - and against - themselves AND other entities of the government, just as much as citizens do.

With how things shaped up, the innate de jure power struggle should have been "The People Legislative Judicial Executive Corporations"

We're still paying the price, as the Lochner era was incredibly myopic.

Re: Supreme Court rules ex-presidents have immunity for official acts

#722

Post by Ancapistani » Mon, Jul 01, 2024, 9:57 PM UTC

kemotep wrote: post #310

My limited understanding of the ruling: The ruling states that the President is immune from prosecution while exercising official duties of the office of President but can be investigated by a special counsel that is appointed by an act of Congress, and if successfully impeached and convicted can then be charged with said crimes. “Unofficial” acts are not protected by this immunity but a special counsel is still requ…

> Out of context this is quite reasonable and level headed.

That's why I'm opposed to making changes to the way the Court is selected and empaneled.

The fact that it's inconvenient for one party right now is irrelevant. It'll be inconvenient for the other party soon enough.

> In context of the hyper partisan landscape US politics are today, doesn’t seem likely without a supermajority opposition to be able to bring charges against a president, for official or unofficial acts that are crimes.

Good. If it were easy to bring charges against a President, then Presidents wouldn't be able to do anything they were elected to do.

The failure of that protection at the end of the term is one of the major reasons for the end of the Roman Republic. If you repeatedly make powerful political figures choose between prosecution and violence, it won't take long for one of them to choose violence.

The fact that we've peacefully transitioned between presidents ~45 times is honestly rather amazing.

Re: Supreme Court rules ex-presidents have immunity for official acts

#723

Post by Maxatar » Mon, Jul 01, 2024, 9:58 PM UTC

denton-scratch wrote: post #330

dustincoates wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure. You want a President to be able to carry out the roles of the office without concern that his or her political opponents will use the courts to try to punish those actions. There are reasonable disagreements on where Presidential authority begins or ends on many topics, and you want the limits to be either through separation of powers (e.g., the Judicial Branch can bring an end to actions, the Legislative can i…

> You want a President to be able to carry out the roles of the office without concern that his or her political opponents will use the courts to try to punish those actions. Why? In the UK we of course have no president; all government actions can be subjected to judicial review, whichever minister was in charge. Judicial review is a civil procedure, not a criminal one. All the court can do is order the government t…

The UK parliament is not subject to judicial review. Judicial review in the UK only applies to crown corporations or specific public institutions. Such a position would be considered repulsive to the vast majority of Americans.

Re: Supreme Court rules ex-presidents have immunity for official acts

#724

Post by HaZeust » Mon, Jul 01, 2024, 9:58 PM UTC

SubiculumCode wrote: post #680

alluro2 wrote: post #539

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand what weight impeachment still holds in today's world. Trump was impeached twice - and? If Trump, in his second term, is supposed to be held liable through fear of impeachment for his actions, I'm afraid it won't be the counter-weight the Founding Fathers envisioned.

Impeachment is not conviction.

Might as well have been. It's easier to indict a conviction of a high ranking figure 4 times over than it is playing the political game of a successful impeachment.

Re: Supreme Court rules ex-presidents have immunity for official acts

#725

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Jul 01, 2024, 9:58 PM UTC

SubiculumCode wrote: post #680

alluro2 wrote: post #539

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand what weight impeachment still holds in today's world. Trump was impeached twice - and? If Trump, in his second term, is supposed to be held liable through fear of impeachment for his actions, I'm afraid it won't be the counter-weight the Founding Fathers envisioned.

Impeachment is not conviction.

[deleted]

Re: Supreme Court rules ex-presidents have immunity for official acts

#726

Post by ethbr1 » Mon, Jul 01, 2024, 9:58 PM UTC

mixologic wrote: post #591

throwadobe wrote: post #518

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone seems to be calling this "blanket immunity" but that's not right. It's immunity for official acts which are the prerogative of the president. Basically the president is allowed to do all presidential things without having to worry about whether it will be deemed illegal. This doesn't mean that the president cannot be tried for some illegal act that was not their official duty. Murdering someone, for example.

If by "Everyone" you mean at least one of the sitting supreme court justices. What is considered "official duty" is not clearly defined, and will certainly be twisted to include things that seem like they obviously shouldnt be considered "official". But if a president claims that a surgical strike to eliminate an "enemy of the country" was within their prerogative, then yes, a president can murder somebody without fe…

With regards to (b)(ii)(3), i.e. Trump's attempt to influence non-federal officials to select fake electors...

>> On Trump’s view, the alleged conduct qualifies as official because it was undertaken to ensure the integrity and proper administration of the federal election. As the Government sees it, however, Trump can point to no plausible source of authority enabling the President to take such actions. Determining whose characterization may be correct, and with respect to which conduct, requires a fact-specific analysis of the indictment’s extensive and interrelated allegations. The Court accordingly remands to the District Court to determine in the first instance whether Trump’s conduct in this area qualifies as official or unofficial. Pp. 24–28.

Which seems a key window for the lower court to send the case back up.

   Trump attempted to influence non-federal election officials.

   Trump had no Presidential authority to do so. (Elections being run by the states)

   Ergo, that was not an official act.

Granted, the special counsel would have to prove that without using the Presidential personal notes... but it's still a pretty clear path given the non-Presidential documentation all the conspirators kept.

And it does make sense by the Supreme Court's reasoning: you can't restrict the President from running the executive branch, but you can hold him accountable for the things he does outside of the executive branch, which critically includes elections themselves.

Re: Supreme Court rules ex-presidents have immunity for official acts

#727

Post by godelski » Mon, Jul 01, 2024, 9:59 PM UTC

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #546

Article III of the U.S. Constitution is incredibly brief [1]. I propose the Supreme Court be reconstituted such that for each case a panel of judges from the appellate courts is chosen by lot. They hear that case, write their opinion, and then go back to that work. New case, new lot. Having a permanent bench of judicial oligarchs made sense before telecommunication. It doesn’t anymore. Every ancient democracy used ra…

> Article III of the U.S. Constitution is incredibly brief [1].

So is the constitution. But I think what also matters a lot is things like the Federalist papers. Where these aren't explicit laws but are the motivations and philosophy behind them. Ruling by the letter of the law will always be tyrannical because no thing is perfect.

Federalist 78[0]

> The interpretation of the laws is the proper and peculiar province of the courts. A constitution is, in fact, and must be regarded by the judges, as a fundamental law. It therefore belongs to them to ascertain its meaning, as well as the meaning of any particular act proceeding from the legislative body. If there should happen to be an irreconcilable variance between the two, that which has the superior obligation and validity ought, of course, to be preferred; or, in other words, the Constitution ought to be preferred to the statute, the intention of the people to the intention of their agents.

It's also worth mentioning here that this same document specifies that the judicial branch and executive branch are to remain distinct. That all the judicial branch can do is issue judgement, but are not capable of executing such judgement. I mention this because there is another question that arises if the one in charge of the executive branch is judged to have committed a crime by the judicial branch. But of course, this is back to the point that there are no global optima. There is no free lunch.

[0] https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/fed78.asp

Re: Supreme Court rules ex-presidents have immunity for official acts

#728

Post by vsuperpower2020 » Mon, Jul 01, 2024, 10:03 PM UTC

tstrimple wrote: post #504

throwaway4220 wrote: post #411

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nixon resigned knowing an impeachment was pending. I cannot imagine that ever happening today.

Conservatives since Nixon have been working to ensure none of them could be taken down like he was. This is just the final chapter in them successfully implementing their plan that began with Fox News.

[flagged]

Re: Supreme Court rules ex-presidents have immunity for official acts

#729

Post by mjfl » Mon, Jul 01, 2024, 10:05 PM UTC

And they do not have immunity for unofficial acts, which do seem to be many of the things that that Donald Trump is being charged for. The fact that many of the top comments here don't mention this tells me that we are grips of a partisan hysteria. Fortunately, the court is not, and one 'conservative' judge was in the dissent, and one 'liberal' judge concurred with the majority.

Re: Supreme Court rules ex-presidents have immunity for official acts

#730

Post by ethbr1 » Mon, Jul 01, 2024, 10:05 PM UTC

dagmx wrote: post #26

afavour wrote: post #8

I'm dismayed by this ruling but I'm curious: can someone defend it? I'm able to understand the counter-perspectives to my own on many hot-button issues (2nd amendment, abortion bans) but this one seems very nakedly bad. But maybe I'm just not seeing the counterpoint?

I can’t defend the ruling based on the actual effects, because it puts someone above the law. However one could argue that this is the logical extension of qualified immunity for police officers which is precedent the court has already set. To be clear though, I think qualified immunity of any sort shouldn’t be allowed. It’s a subversion of any kind of fair justice.

The office of the President has always been above many laws.

The redress has been assumed to be federal elections.

If the President were to abuse the law (to the extent he could with the power of the executive branch), then he would be voted out of office in (max) 4 years.