OPINION: Is the U.S. Supreme Court now a threat to democracy?

Our American “founding fathers,” people like George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, tried their best to create an honest and fair government when they declared independence from England and wrote our Constitution. They didn’t want us to be ruled by a king or dictator. They wanted separation between church and state, helping citizens to be able to choose their religion without persecution from other religions. They created a three-branch government consisting of a presidential administration, legislature and court system, all designed to be a check and balance to each other in order to preserve our democracy. For most of U.S. history, this arrangement has served us well. In recent years, however, the U.S. Supreme Court has been issuing rulings that I believe are endangering our democracy by ruling in favor of minority factions, sanctioning political dishonesty, benefiting the super rich over the needs of ordinary people and paving the way for a possible future dictatorship.

In the Citizens United decision in 2010, the Supreme Court ruled that big corporations and the super rich could spend unlimited amounts of money buying politicians and legislation to benefit their interests, unfettered by campaign finance laws meant to empower ordinary people.

In the Rucho v. Common Cause case in 2019, the Supreme Court ruled that gerrymandering should be addressed by legislative instead of judicial remedies. But why would legislative people fix a problem that they themselves created? (A substantial percentage of the members of our U.S. Congress were state legislators before they moved up to the federal level.) I believe the current majority on the Supreme Court is supporting gerrymandering because they know it benefits Republican-controlled states much more often than Democrat-controlled states. Either way, I believe it is extremely undemocratic and should be illegal. Equitable voting maps should be made by nonpartisan state officials. I think voters should have an honest chance to pick their politicians, rather than politicians being able to pick their voters. I believe that ensuring voting maps are fair is the kind of role our founding fathers built the U.S. Supreme Court for and if our Court refuses to do it, they are corrupt.

Most recently, the conservative majority on the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a gerrymander described as racial in South Carolina was political instead and refused to fix it when, in fact, it was both. They said it was OK because it was a political gerrymander. How can an honest court ever say that a racial or political gerrymander is acceptable?

In December 2023, Special Counsel Jack Smith asked the U.S. Supreme Court to expedite a decision about whether Donald Trump has immunity from his actions to overturn the 2020 election so the American people would be able to see the results of his court case in plenty of time before voting in November. Finally, on the last day of their session this July, the six conservative justices overruled the three liberal justices to decide that, for the most part, a U.S. president does have immunity for a host of possible criminal activities. The Supreme Court has obviously put their thumbs on the scales of justice to help Trump avoid prosecution before election time, and worse, if elected again, be able to attack his political opponents and anybody else he has a grievance against.

Jack Jackson is a democracy advocate and professional musician. He lives in Anchorage.

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