In-practice most federal offices have deferred to what the Supreme Court says, but we haven’t really seen what happens when e.g. a sitting president insists on an interpretation of the constitution that disagrees, and the constitution itself provides no clear answer.
This is a somewhat confusing statement. To be clear, it’s extremely common for the president to disagree with courts on the law or Constitution: this happens dozens of times per presidential term. And when they lose in court the president may declare that they still think they are right and the Court ruled incorrectly. But this wouldn’t cause a constitutional crisis or anything by default: the president almost always follows court orders or court opinions. It’s a very ingrained norm in the US that court orders, especially from the Supreme Court, are binding.
(relevant thread from a lawyer early last year on the powers and tools that courts have to force a president or other federal officials to follow their court orders, such as freezing assets).
I think there’s a lot of reasoning here that effectively goes “if the president has absolute power such that the military and federal officers will always listen to his orders, then the US legal system will have trouble reigning him in.” Which is kind of just begging the question. But somewhere in the chain of events you suggest, the president would break a lot of clear red lines and probably lose nearly all of his political support from the general population and the powerful elements of society, unless the he has already broadly persuaded people that his power-grabbing actions are actually a good idea.
the president almost always follows court orders or court opinions. It’s a very ingrained norm in the US that court orders, especially from the Supreme Court, are binding.
Sorry if this wasn’t clear. The whole point of this exploration is to figure out what happens when the president does not follow court orders. I will adjust the intro to clarify that.
I agree this would be approximately unprecedented! But it seems very much a scenario worth exploring. I made these edits to make that clearer:
So, let’s say the supreme court wants to stop a sitting president from destroying democracy in America. First, they release a judgement saying that something the executive branch is doing is unconstitutional. Hopefully the U.S. president agrees and then just stops doing that. But what happens when the executive branch keeps doing it anyways?
[...]
So, with this background knowledge, I see roughly 4 big ways the supreme court can try to reign in an out of control executive branch that isn’t listening to a judgement they made:
But this wouldn’t cause a constitutional crisis or anything by default: the president almost always follows court orders or court opinions.
There’s some complexity because historically the Supreme Court also tends to show restraint by not making rulings that it doesn’t expect people to follow.
I think in general when discussing these “Constitutional crisis” topics it helps to
Not think too much in terms of formalities but only in terms of norms
Look back in history for what it precedented or unprecedented, partly because this will also decouple the discussion from debates about current political questions/actors
(relevant thread from a lawyer early last year on the powers and tools that courts have to force a president or other federal officials to follow their court orders, such as freezing assets).
“Force” seems strong compared to what the thread says. He starts with “no chance of the White House successfully refusing to comply” but for every mechanism except freezing assets, he caveats with “this might work”
This is a somewhat confusing statement. To be clear, it’s extremely common for the president to disagree with courts on the law or Constitution: this happens dozens of times per presidential term. And when they lose in court the president may declare that they still think they are right and the Court ruled incorrectly. But this wouldn’t cause a constitutional crisis or anything by default: the president almost always follows court orders or court opinions. It’s a very ingrained norm in the US that court orders, especially from the Supreme Court, are binding.
(relevant thread from a lawyer early last year on the powers and tools that courts have to force a president or other federal officials to follow their court orders, such as freezing assets).
I think there’s a lot of reasoning here that effectively goes “if the president has absolute power such that the military and federal officers will always listen to his orders, then the US legal system will have trouble reigning him in.” Which is kind of just begging the question. But somewhere in the chain of events you suggest, the president would break a lot of clear red lines and probably lose nearly all of his political support from the general population and the powerful elements of society, unless the he has already broadly persuaded people that his power-grabbing actions are actually a good idea.
Sorry if this wasn’t clear. The whole point of this exploration is to figure out what happens when the president does not follow court orders. I will adjust the intro to clarify that.
I agree this would be approximately unprecedented! But it seems very much a scenario worth exploring. I made these edits to make that clearer:
Hope that makes it clearer to future readers!
There’s some complexity because historically the Supreme Court also tends to show restraint by not making rulings that it doesn’t expect people to follow.
I think in general when discussing these “Constitutional crisis” topics it helps to
Not think too much in terms of formalities but only in terms of norms
Look back in history for what it precedented or unprecedented, partly because this will also decouple the discussion from debates about current political questions/actors
“Force” seems strong compared to what the thread says. He starts with “no chance of the White House successfully refusing to comply” but for every mechanism except freezing assets, he caveats with “this might work”