"Stern also explains why he remains very dubious, at best, that either Maine's Republican Senator Susan Collins or Alaska's Lisa Murkowski will break from their party to vote against Trump's nominee (Collins, he explains, is "not widely known for having a spine" and Murkowski, so far, has shown little sign of having one either)...."

Perhaps the only thing holding certain people upright are the strings.

Warning: The person writing these words is to the left of Bernie Sanders, who I think is the coolest guy (and the most popular elected official in the US of A).

Here it comes. Since I learned, decades ago, of FDR's desire to pack the Supremes as a threat against the efforts to stop his economically progressive agenda, I have been leery toward progressive calls to bring that idea back. It somehow always struck me cheating by buying a pre-chosen outcome not on merit but on an invidious loyalty borne on simple numerical advantage. As you and Mark Joseph Stern observe, there is no provision in the Constitution that forbids expanding the size of the Supreme Court's number of justices. Mr. Stern observed that such a move should be "remedial (and not proactive)" and would be a "proportionate response to what Republicans did to Merrick Garland and Barack Obama." Such an act would, of course require Democratic control of the Congress and the White House, but it would be a response to the stops along the road of the conservative agenda "to return us to the Lochner era" by striking down the progressive decisions that make this country a place that one would actually want to live in. The numerical advantage of a "packed court" is manifest when considering that the advantage redounds to both an institutional protection of democracy and the protection and advancement of a progressive agenda (which would act a feedback loop turning back toward the protection of democracy). In such a scenario, right-wingers would very well live in peace; but they would be denied the ability to molest their fellow human beings (and the earth, for that matter) or to do so without paying dearly for it.

Thanks to your interview with Mr. Stern I have now come around to that thinking. I and my wife have been speculating about what would happen if Roe was struck down. Would anti-abortion states really punish women who crossed state lines to get the procedure in a state that had full abortion rights on the books, and how harshly would they if the did? Would the anti states form a kind of "confederacy" so that crossing them out of an anti state on the path into a pro one triggers a kind of "operation condor" style of enforcement, supported by a kind of "Dred Scot" ruling-flavored agreement, where each of the crossed states could press its own charges against the abortion seeker and her accomplices? Would the pro state-domiciled medical professional(s) who did an abortion for a woman who fled an anti state to get to the pro state-located facility be liable in the anti state where the woman came from AND in the anti states that she crossed to get to the pro state-located facility? Would the anti states create a kind of "fugitive pregnant woman law" for women caught in transit, and would the anti states demand a kind of "extradition agreement" with the pro states? Would the anti states demand that women register their pregnancies with the authorities which would then monitor the women's movements? What kind of laws, if we consider the previous questions, would be passed by the anti states regarding contraception? Could the claim finally be made that a woman has no rights that a man is bound to respect?

In our speculations things really go downhill from there.

We also understand that if Roe were struck down, the likelihood of woman-led backlash from which the Republicans may be unable to recover would greatly increase (and that is an optimistic scenario because such a backlash has not happened in the abortion-restrictive states; rather, it took lawsuits to slow the assault upon reproductive freedom in those states).

Your citation David Farris' book and Mr. Stern's consideration of the court-packing idea (without coming down one way or another on it) has me thinking that such a strategy would be one of the few options – and it is a hard-charging one at that – that could help keep this nation, frankly, intact. Trump getting as far as a third Supreme Court pick while the Senate was still in Republican hands would be the opening lines in a national suicide note.

It is a lot to ask but could you invite Mr. Ferris, Mr. Stern and any others you and Desi could think of to your show for a kind of round-table discussion that, among other things, would serve to talk us progressives away from the edge – by which I mean the northern border. Because Canada is lookin' real good right about now. That line was a joke in the summer of 2016. It ain't in 2018.

So, how ‘bout it, huh? I can offer a few names…

What happens if a few "Democrat" senators vote for this guy? That's what happened with Gorsuch.

Donald Pruden @2:

Appreciate the thoughtful response. I too was against the notion of Court packing, as FDR attempted. I would probably be against it, as well, if it was ONLY based on some of the policy matters you cite. But the fact that the majority was simply STOLEN, as brazenly as it was by the GOP in 2016, has led me to feel very differently about such hardball tactics.

As we discussed in more detail during my April interview with David Faris, there are a number of such hardball tactics that Dems are now forced to consider if they wish to keep their party --- and this country --- alive, IMO.

Mark Joseph Stern is an awesome guest.

I love hearing what he has to say, every single time he's on.

Pure gold.