• givesomefucks@lemmy.worldOP
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    5 months ago

    Not so fun fact:

    Reagan appointed the first judge directly to the federal circuit court…

    And she’s still fucking sitting there at 97 years old

    At 97, Newman is the oldest judge on the federal bench. She was appointed in 1984 by President Ronald Reagan and was the first judge appointed directly to the Federal Circuit.

    Maybe we should cap it at like 100?

    I mean. Ideally way younger, but it’s insane there’s no cap at all for a lifetime appointment.

    • dhork@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      Since the Supreme Court is full of Originalists now, let’s think the way the farmers would have thought. When they wrote “lifetime appointments” into the Constitution, the average life expectancy for a male child at birth was 35 years. But that counts a lot of infant and child deaths, not to mention deaths due to military service. A man who managed to make it to 50 years old in 1789 would probably have at least 21 years left. Source

      So, all lifetime appointments should be forced to retire at 71, because that’s how long a lifetime appointment in 1789 would have lasted. Hey, Clarence, will you go along with my thorough analysis if I give you a “gratuity” afterwards?

      • FireTower@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        I don’t think your example portrays originalism. They could have said “Until they reach the age of average life expectancy” then but instead went with life time appointments when in good behavior. A lifetime being serving until that judge dies, unless they’ve given up their seat.

        To change lifetime appointments we’d need a constitutional amendment.

        • dhork@lemmy.world
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          5 months ago

          Your using logic and facts to drive your conclusions, though. You’re supposed to do it the other way around: start with your conclusion, and cherry-pick facts to reach it. Once you learn that, you, too can be a Conservate SC Justice!

          • FireTower@lemmy.world
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            5 months ago

            Your example is actually much closer to Living Constitutionalism which based on this comment I’m going to assume you probably don’t want to be criticizing.

            Originalism is tethered to textualism which is antithetical to your analogy reading words out of text.

    • cygnus@lemmy.ca
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      5 months ago

      FWIW judges in my Canadian province have mandatory retirement at age 75.