WIKI
Posted on 12/20/2023 10:50:25 AM PST by Ultra Sonic 007
The Colorado Supreme Court ruled yesterday that Donald Trump will not appear on the ballot in 2024 because he is an insurrectionist and the 14th Amendment does not permit insurrectionists to hold federal office. Some of you may recall our August 2023 post on this matter. Both J. Michael Luttig, a retired George W. Bush-appointed federal judge whose judicial philosophy has drawn comparisons to the late Antonin Scalia, and Harvard law professor Laurence Tribe (who taught constitutional law to Supreme Court Justices John Roberts and Samuel Alito), believe that Section 3 of the 14th Amendment disqualifies Trump.
Section 3 of the 14th Amendment reads:
No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.
Here is a taste of Jordan Rubin’s interview with Luttig at MSNBC.Com:
Jordan Rubin: Judge, you’ve been thinking a lot lately about this 14th Amendment issue. Why is it so important to democracy, in your view?
J. Michael Luttig: Section 3 of the 14th Amendment … disqualifies any person who, having taken an oath to support the Constitution of the United States, thereafter engages in an insurrection or rebellion against the Constitution of the United States, disqualifying that person from holding high public office in the future, including the presidency. So it’s more than just a proscription and disqualification for anti-democratic conduct by an individual, but, in this circumstance, it is that and it would apply in this instance to disqualify the former president from holding the presidency again, because of his effort, plan and attempt to overturn the 2020 presidential election, knowing that he had lost that election to then-candidate Joe Biden. This is very, very important: Section 3 disqualifies one who has engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the Constitution of the United States, not an insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or the authority of the United States. And so that’s the issue in Colorado and in Minnesota, and in the other states that are currently involved in the constitutional process to determine whether the former president is disqualified.
JR: What do you think of criticism that suggests it’s wrong to keep Trump off the ballot using this process, as opposed to “letting the voters decide,” as a critic would say?
JML: I have seen that criticism, if you will, of applying Section 3 to the former president. And it concerned me because it’s a legitimate question to be asked. But I’ve responded publicly to that concern by explaining that the disqualification that’s provided for under Section 3 is not itself anti-democratic at all. Rather, it’s the conduct that can result in disqualification under the 14th Amendment that the Constitution says is anti-democratic. So there’s no question whatsoever that disqualification of an individual who satisfies the conditions of disqualification in Section 3 is not anti-democratic. Again, it’s the conduct that gives rise to disqualification that the Constitution tells us is anti-democratic.
JR: Sometimes when I’ve heard these criticisms, it almost sounds like more of a criticism against the Constitution itself — sort of a problem with having the ability to take someone off the ballot — more than an application of it.
JML: That’s exactly the way to think of it. And another way of saying it is: it is the Constitution itself that provides for disqualification. So there’s no possible way that the Constitution itself can be understood as anti-democratic.
JR: As you mentioned, we have these cases that are playing out across the country. Whatever happens in Colorado, Minnesota, Michigan or wherever else, the issue has to get to the Supreme Court somehow, doesn’t it?
JML: It does. This is the process contemplated by the Constitution. And the Constitution likewise contemplates that this decision will ultimately be entrusted to the Supreme Court of the United States, which will interpret the language, the clear language, of Section 3, and decide whether or not the former president is disqualified.
JR: To ask the natural follow-up, do you have any inkling about how the Supreme Court might look at this issue?
JML: I would only say this: All that any of us are able to do is evaluate the positive, objective law — in this instance, the Constitution and Section 3 of the 14th Amendment. Under the plain, clear terms of Section 3, the former president would be disqualified from holding the presidency again — specifically, for the reason that his plan and effort and attempt to overturn the 2020 presidential election and remain in power, notwithstanding that the American people had voted to confer the powers of the presidency on Joe Biden, constitutes a clear violation of the Executive Vesting Clause in the Constitution, which prescribes that a president will hold office for only a four-year term, unless and until he is re-elected to the presidency by the American people. The former president’s effort to overturn the election and remain in power is precisely what constitutes a rebellion against the Constitution of the United States.
Read the rest here.
Bushies want Trump off the ballot even more than the Rats do.
Why stop there?
On June 6th, 1898 the fifty-fifth Congress effectively removed section 3 with “Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of The United States in Congress assembled, That the disability imposed by section three of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States heretofore incurred is hereby removed.”
See it for yourself here: https://govtrackus.s3.amazonaws.com/legislink/pdf/stat/30/STATUTE-30-Pg432b.pdf
(H/T to ‘Atlanta Grandpa’ posting on theconservativetreehouse)
Yes! We should set up a fund drive to ensure that happens.
Is the Pres a “civil officer”?
What I’ve read so far tends to No.
“When was that determined? (Trump was an insurrectionist)”
It’s all about that question. Forget about that judge.
Here’s a parsing of Section 3 of the 14th Amendment:
“No person [who is or has been]
(a) a Senator or Representative in Congress,
(b) or elector of President and Vice-President,
(c) or hold any office, civil or military,
(1) under the United States,
(2) or under any State, who, having previously taken an
oath, as a member of Congress,
(3) or as an officer of the United States,
(4) or as a member of any State legislature,
(5) or as an executive or judicial officer of any State,
to support the Constitution of the United States,
shall have
(a) engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the
same,
(b) or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.
But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.”
“these people are trying to start civil war.”
What they fail to understand, if if they’re successful, they will be the first hung from the lamp posts.
The verdict is in on the completely unprincipled John Roberts. Should be more worry about Coney Barrett and Kavanaugh.
Complete nonsense from butt-kissing RINO appeasers who hate Trump.
Where are the charges that the Colorado electors for Trump engaged in insurrection against the US Constitution? Lefttards say Trump did, Trump did, however, in this case, this clause can only be used against presidential electors, not the actual candidate. This means that the electors must have engaged in insurrection, not the actual candidate.
The Colorado supremes made their ruling based on ‘allegations’, a layman’s concept that carries no weight in US jurisprudence.
Thanks for that!
It seems that declaration then included all person excluded in 1872.
I can’t take credit. Someone else someplace else pointed it out.
“This means that the electors must have engaged in insurrection, not the actual candidate.”
That was my first thought and the reason I parsed the passage. Isn’t the “or elector of President and Vice-President” only one of a list of persons who might have engaged in insurrection?
That’s a nasty passage — the sort of thing that gives lawyers a bad name. Maybe I’ve misinterpreted it.
YES, obviously sold out to the neocon Uniparty Bushies... but still a disappointment and maybe we dodged a bullet in getting compromised gayblade illegaladopter Roberts as unreliable Chief.... ymmv
Why do you think they used those terms sedition and insurrection literally the next day?
The stage for this was set 3 years ago when you had a BS protest with law enforcement waiving people into the capital, a BS government response where they knew it was coming but didn’t take appropriate action / had journalists on hand / and politicians crying on camera of how they feared for their lives. This is Washington political theatrics.
J6 is the political equivalent of this: https://youtu.be/iqQaON-Zqjo?si=hwz1oLp_Buor_76I
Had Trump been charged with, and convicted of insurrection, he would be right. But anyone dealing in intellectual honesty recognizes that January 6 was not even close to an insurrection.
J. Michael? Jackass Michael?
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