• Home
  • Opinion
  • Quizzes
  • Redistricting
  • Sections
  • About Us
  • Voting
  • Independent Voter News
  • Campaign Finance
  • Civic Ed
  • Directory
  • Election Dissection
  • Events
  • Fact Check
  • Glossary
  • News
  • Analysis
  • Subscriptions
  • Log in
Leveraging Our Differences
  • news & opinion
    • Big Picture
      • Civic Ed
      • Ethics
      • Leadership
      • Leveraging big ideas
      • Media
    • Business & Democracy
      • Corporate Responsibility
      • Impact Investment
      • Innovation & Incubation
      • Small Businesses
      • Stakeholder Capitalism
    • Elections
      • Campaign Finance
      • Independent Voter News
      • Redistricting
      • Voting
    • Government
      • Balance of Power
      • Budgeting
      • Congress
      • Judicial
      • Local
      • State
      • White House
    • Justice
      • Accountability
      • Anti-corruption
      • Budget equity
    • Columns
      • Beyond Right and Left
      • Civic Soul
      • Congress at a Crossroads
      • Cross-Partisan Visions
      • Democracy Pie
      • Our Freedom
  • Pop Culture
      • American Heroes
      • Ask Joe
      • Celebrity News
      • Comedy
      • Dance, Theatre & Film
      • Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging
      • Faithful & Mindful Living
      • Music, Poetry & Arts
      • Sports
      • Technology
      • Your Take
      • American Heroes
      • Ask Joe
      • Celebrity News
      • Comedy
      • Dance, Theatre & Film
      • Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging
      • Faithful & Mindful Living
      • Music, Poetry & Arts
      • Sports
      • Technology
      • Your Take
  • events
  • About
      • Mission
      • Advisory Board
      • Staff
      • Contact Us
Sign Up
  1. Home>
  2. Newsletter>
  3. newsletter>

‘Five alarm fire’ for democracy

The Fulcrum
December 06, 2022



Court prepares to hear arguments in case that could upend system of checks and balances

Chances are, if you read The Fulcrum, you may have read about the “independent state legislature doctrine” in recent months. But probably never before 2022. That’s because for the past century, the Supreme Court has dismissed the fringe theory time after time.

But that may change, starting tomorrow, when the justices hear oral arguments in Harper v. Moore, a North Carolina redistricting case that has the potential to eliminate the right of state-level executive and judicial branches to check the power of legislators when it comes to election law.

“It’s a five-alarm fire for people concerned about democracy,” according to Hudson McCormick, North Carolina director of the progressive State Innovation Exchange.

Proponents of the ISLD argue that the Constitution gives legislatures the sole power to determine election law, even when those same legislatures have assigned authority to other branches. Four conservatives on the Supreme Court have indicated their willingness to consider – maybe even endorse – those arguments.

The justices, as much as the attorneys for the two sides, will be under the microscope Wednesday.

“Our democracy doesn’t work when corrupt politicians have unchecked power to rig elections,” said Joshua Graham Lynn, CEO of the nonpartisan reform group RepresentUs. “The Supreme Court must reject this shameless politician power grab.”

Read more.

The state of voting

Following the 2020 election, Georgia became the proving ground for conservatives’ efforts to tighten election laws. We’re seeing some of those changes play out this week, as voters in the Peach State cast the final ballots in the runoff election for Senate.

A law passed last year cut the time between the general election and the runoff in half, reduced the number of required early voting days for runoffs from 17 to five and eliminated the requirement that counties offer early voting on the weekends.

Voters have reported waiting in line for hours to cast early ballots, and thousands in the Atlanta area say their mailed ballots arrived too late to meet the submission deadline.

Elsewhere, in the Voting Rights Lab’s weekly roundup of election law activity:

  • A Committee in the Ohio House of Representatives will hold hearings this week on a bill that would restrict acceptable forms of voter ID, limit secretary of state authority, prohibit prepaid postage for mail ballots and remove provisions from the bill establishing automatic voter registration.
  • A bill prefiled in Missouri would restore voting eligibility to people with past felony people to probation before regaining the right to vote.
  • Rhode Island’s incoming secretary of state, Gregg Amore, cited legislation establishing same-day registration and the implementation of an online mail ballot request system as his top priorities.

Read more.

Your take: Terminating the Constitution – convention, anyone?

Have we gone too far beyond the founders' intent of how we should self-govern as a nation? Should we start over? Donald Trump recently raised the specter of terminating the Constitution and while that is a step too far, perhaps it’s time to consider some changes.

Even Thomas Jefferson famously endorsed a constitutional convention to bring about change. In 1816, he wrote a letter suggesting that each generation should have the opportunity to "choose for itself the form of government it believes most promotive of its own happiness."

With that in mind...

  1. If you were to amend the constitution, what would you amend?
  2. If you prefer to start over, how would a new constitution be different?

Send your thoughts to The Fulcrum’s Debilyn Molineaux by noon Wednesday. Responses will be published Friday.

Video: Is democracy all good now?

In the run up to the 2022 election, FiveThirtyEight tracked what every single Republican nominee for House, Senate, governor, secretary of state and attorney general said about the legitimacy of the 2020 election. Thirty-five percent fully rejected Joe Biden’s win and another 10 percent cast doubt on it. In this installment of the FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast, Galen Druke speaks with reporter Kaleigh Rogers about how candidates who denied the legitimacy of the 2020 election did in the midterms.

Watch.

Also in the news

5 things to watch as Georgia decides Warnock vs. Walker Senate runoff (CNN)

Campaign to give 16-year-olds voting rights gaining steam after Boston City Council vote (KOMO News)

Supreme Court Rejects Conspiracy Theory-Laden Case Against Dominion Voting Systems (Law & Crime)

Push to get rid of Mississippi’s felony voting ban continues with request for SCOTUS to take it up (WLBT)

Upcoming events

National Symposium on Social Cohesion & Security - Trust Network - Dec. 6

Harm Reduction 101: Health Providers and Harm Reduction - R Street - Dec. 6

The Independent Voter - Politics for the People - Dec. 7

Democracy Happy Hour - Fix Democracy First - Dec. 7

Your Post-Election Action Plan Part II - Younify - Dec. 7

From Your Site Articles
  • Court unlikely to buy independent state legislature theory - The Fulcrum ›
newsletter

Want to write
for The Fulcrum?

If you have something to say about ways to protect or repair our American democracy, we want to hear from you.

Submit
Get some Leverage Sign up for The Fulcrum Newsletter
Confirm that you are not a bot.
×
Follow

Support Democracy Journalism; Join The Fulcrum

The Fulcrum daily platform is where insiders and outsiders to politics are informed, meet, talk, and act to repair our democracy and make it live and work in our everyday lives. Now more than ever our democracy needs a trustworthy outlet

Contribute
Contributors

Conservatives attacking Americans’ First Amendment rights

Steve Corbin

To advance racial equity, policy makers must move away from the "Black and Brown" discourse

Julio A. Alicea

Policymakers must address worsening civil unrest post Roe

Sarah K. Burke

Video: How to salvage U.S. democracy from the "tyranny of the minority"

Our Staff

What "Progress" should look like, and what we get wrong

Damien De Pyle

The long kiss goodnight: Nancy Pelosi and the protracted decay of public office

Kevin Frazier
latest News

How statelessness gambles with the lives of American families

Samantha Sitterly
15h

Podcast: Is reunification still possible?

Our Staff
15h

Pin the blame on the other party

Rachel Bonar
26 September

Dark magic: Drug companies and the art of deception

Robert Pearl
26 September

Sit down with Deepa Iyer of Building Movement Project

Debilyn Molineaux
26 September

Societal disruption: Artificial intelligence

Kevin Frazier
25 September
Videos
Video: Expert baffled by Trump contradicting legal team

Video: Expert baffled by Trump contradicting legal team

Our Staff
Video: Do white leaders hinder black aspirations?

Video: Do white leaders hinder black aspirations?

Our Staff
Video: How to prepare for student loan repayments returning

Video: How to prepare for student loan repayments returning

Our Staff
Video: The history of Labor Day

Video: The history of Labor Day

Our Staff
Video: Trump allies begin to flip as prosecutions move forward

Video: Trump allies begin to flip as prosecutions move forward

Our Staff
Video Rewind: Trans-partisan practices and the "superpower of respect"

Video Rewind: Trans-partisan practices and the "superpower of respect"

Our Staff
Podcasts

Podcast: Is reunification still possible?

Our Staff
15h

Podcast: All politics is local

Our Staff
22 September

Podcast: How states hold fair elections

Our Staff
14 September

Podcast: The MAGA Bubble, Bidenonmics and Playing the Victim

Debilyn Molineaux
David Riordan
12 September
Recommended
How statelessness gambles with the lives of American families

How statelessness gambles with the lives of American families

Big Picture
Conservatives attacking Americans’ First Amendment rights

Conservatives attacking Americans’ First Amendment rights

Big Picture
Podcast: Is reunification still possible?

Podcast: Is reunification still possible?

Podcasts
Pin the blame on the other party

Pin the blame on the other party

Government
Dark magic: Drug companies and the art of deception

Dark magic: Drug companies and the art of deception

Big Picture
Sit down with Deepa Iyer of Building Movement Project

Sit down with Deepa Iyer of Building Movement Project

Big Picture