An Immodest Supreme Court Proposal

Today is the beginning of a new U.S. Supreme Court session. Randi Rhodes mentioned this, and the way the U.S. Supreme Court begins a session by TURNING DOWN appeals that have made it to their highest court -- and that there were over two thousand such refusals.

My Immodest Proposal for the U.S. Supreme Court is that -- SINCE our nation has changed and GROWN in geographical size and population of citizens -- the U.S. Supreme Court should grow in size as well to reflect that change and growing need, and do that by means of creating ADDITIONAL SEATS on the Supreme Court Bench. In this way, fairness to our population and their needs can be served and their many cases can be ruled more ON VALIDITY rather that just how many cases can be heard in a few months each year in the 'humanly possible' labor terms of a court with just nine justices.

Sure the U.S. Supreme Court Justices must guard against being overworked, because there are just too few of them.

I say increase the number of Justices -- increased by at least ten additional Justices -- so that they can review more cases in stages that permit valid cases to meet review in the high court as the Constitution intended without risk of dismissal for no other reason than lack of legal minds on the SPOTUS bench.

This would result in the simultaneous solution to another problem with the current court: The U.S. Supreme Court does not reflect the make-up of this nation and so fails to come to court with an understanding of the citizenry and their needs and expectations in relation to the Constitution. More specifically, the court's Justices consistently being white males is not reflective of our citizenry and having more Justices added could AT LAST balance that obvious injustice.

So, ADD MORE U.S. Supreme Court Justices of diverse backgrounds and so HEAR more cases, and simultaneously create a court that serves us both in its labor and representative make-up.

Others have suggested that the terms of the Justices be limited rather than granted for life. One suggestion is eighteen years. Before taking a position on that additional change, I would need to do more research. At present I believe wisdom (and I hope wisdom comes close to being objectivity) is something that grows and increases with age, but I need more proof before I would pass up an opportunity to address the length of terms of Supreme Court Justices if other changes were being made too.