Pretty amazing upside-downworld stuff: when Congress *actually* tries to legislate under sec. 5 (or it's 13th or 15th Amendment counterparts), the justices strike it down. Sec. 5 is only usable as a cudgel against other institutions when Congress is silent, apparently.
it was really unfair for the US to pass the 13th through 15th Amendments given that those were things that made Confederates mad, they should have worked with the Confederates to make the government more to their liking, clearly
I just finished teaching the Enforcement Clauses last week, and my notes include a line about "one reading of Sec. 5 is that *only* Congress has the authority to enforce the provisions of the 14th Amendment; the judiciary must stay out. But nobody really believes that...."
Every time I think of this Sec 3 case, I think of Akhil Amar getting angry in class about a Sec 5 case (maybe Morrison?), waving his pocket Constitution and shouting "People fought and died for this! People fought and died for this!"
Yeah almost like the majority started with a conclusion and then worked backwards to justify it not worrying about what it'll do to the wider world. Why are you so surprised by this????
No but they actually went so far as to make these cohere
Because a state, you see, wouldn't be limited by City of Boerne v. Flores!
And that would be..... bad, somehow??
🤮
