Packing and Unpacking State Courts
Packing and Unpacking State Courts
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州法院的打包和拆包
DOI：
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发表时间：
2020
期刊：
影响因子：
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通讯作者：
Marin K. Levy
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文献类型：
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作者：
Marin K. Levy
当谈到法庭打包时，“应该”和“可以”的问题密不可分地交织在一起。长期以来，传统观点认为，联邦法院的包装是总统和国会根本无法做到的事情。尽管宪法文本没有直接禁止为了政治利益而扩大或缩小法院规模，但许多人认为，由于对司法独立和权力分立的承诺，长期以来存在反对这样做的规范。因此（论点是），即使政治部门可能会试图增加或减少席位以改变法院的意识形态构成，但出于与宪法和历史相关的原因，他们不应该这样做，也就是说，出于与政治相关的原因，他们不能这样做。
但即使是最严格的规范也容易受到压力，学者和政界人士最近的举动对法庭拥挤的传统观点提出了质疑。主要基于共和党占多数的参议院在 2016 年拒绝就梅里克·加兰法官的提名举行听证会来“拆散”最高法院的说法，一些人开始认为可以进行法庭打包，因为最近已经这样做了（政治右翼），现在也应该这样做（政治左翼）。
在关于最近是否发生过法庭挤塞这一积极问题的争论中，缺少的是，过去几年全国各地的州法院无疑都发生过这种情况。具体而言，在过去十年中，至少十个州曾尝试立法改变终审法院的规模，其中两个州“成功”。此外，这些数字表明尝试次数比过去几十年有所增加。
这篇研讨会文章对有关法院包装和在这个充满政治色彩的时代更普遍地考虑法院的更大辩论进行了温和的干预。具体来说，它描述了最近州最高法院发生的法庭打包和拆包事件。然后，它研究了尝试过此类措施的国家以及这些措施取得成功的国家之间的潜在共性。文章最后考虑了对于那些有兴趣改变（或保持不变）美国最高法院规模的人（包括法院本身）是否可以吸取教训。
When it comes to court packing, questions of “should” and “can” are inextricably intertwined. The conventional wisdom has long been that federal court packing is something the President and Congress simply cannot do. Even though the Constitution’s text does not directly prohibit expanding or contracting the size of courts for political gain, many have argued that there is a longstanding norm against doing so, stemming from a commitment to judicial independence and separation of powers. And so (the argument goes), even though the political branches might otherwise be tempted to add or subtract seats to change the Court’s ideological makeup, for reasons related to the Constitution and history they should not, meaning for reasons related to politics they cannot.
But even the strongest norms are susceptible to pressure, and recent moves by scholars and politicians are calling the conventional wisdom about court packing into question. Based largely on the claim that the majority Republican Senate “unpacked” the Supreme Court by refusing to hold hearings upon the nomination of Judge Merrick Garland in 2016, some have begun to argue that court packing can be done because it recently has been done (by the political right), and now should be done (by the political left).
Missing in the debate over the positive question — whether court packing has recently occurred — is that it has unquestionably happened in the past several years in state courts across the country. Specifically, in the last decade, there have been legislative attempts in at least ten states to alter the size of their courts of last resort, with two being “successful.” Moreover, these figures represent an increase from the number of attempts in decades past.
This symposium Article makes a gentle intervention in the larger debate about court packing and the consideration of courts more generally in these politically charged times. Specifically, it provides a descriptive account of recent incidents of court packing and unpacking in state supreme courts. It then examines potential commonalities among the states in which such measures have been attempted and then those in which they succeeded. The Article finally considers whether there are lessons to be drawn for those interested in shifting — or keeping static — the size of the U.S. Supreme Court, including members of the Court itself.