Last year, amid growing calls from liberals and the left for Supreme Court reform, then-candidate Joseph Biden committed to establishing “a national commission—a bipartisan commission—of scholars, constitutional scholars, Democrats, Republicans, liberal, conservative, and I will ask them to, over 180 days, [to] come back to me with recommendations as to how to reform the court system because it’s getting out of whack.” Within the next few weeks, the Presidential Commission on the Supreme Court will release its final report. While it will no longer provide “recommendations,” the report represents an important milestone in the movement to reform a Court whose democratic legitimacy has come under increasing question.
On Monday, November 15 at 6:00 PM, join the Law & Political Economy Student Group at Yale Law School for a panel discussion on the Supreme Court Commission and its place within the Court reform movement. Panelists will discuss what the Commission report might say based on the materials released so far, what it should say, and how it may impact the prospects for particular reforms going forward. More broadly, the panel will discuss the merits of blue ribbon commissions like the Supreme Court Commission as the focal point for political reform efforts; the appropriate role of the Court in U.S. democracy; avenues for effective social mobilization in support of judicial reform; and how law students can contribute to this growing movement.
Panelists:
- Chris Kang, Co-Founder and Chief Counsel, Demand Justice
- Leah Litman, Assistant Professor of Law, University of Michigan
- The Honorable Sheldon Whitehouse, U.S. Senator for the State of Rhode Island and Chair, Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Federal Courts, Oversight, Agency Action, and Federal Rights
- Samuel Moyn, Henry R. Luce Professor of Jurisprudence and Professor of History, Yale University (moderator)