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President also says presidential immunity for crimes should be removed and ethics rules for justices should be stricter
Joe Biden has called for a series of reforms to the US Supreme Court, including the introduction of term limits for justices and a constitutional amendment to remove immunity for crimes committed by a president while in office.
In an op-ed published on Monday morning, the president said justices should be limited to a maximum of 18 years’ service on the court rather than the current lifetime appointment, and also said ethics rules should be strengthened to regulate justices’ behavior.
The call for reform comes after the supreme court ruled in early July that former presidents have some degree of immunity from prosecution, a decision that served as a major victory for Donald Trump amid his legal travails.
“This nation was founded on a simple yet profound principle: No one is above the law. Not the president of the United States. Not a justice on the Supreme Court of the United States,” Biden wrote.
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The problem is that doing any of these things in a matter which will stick will require amendments, because that is the only process that this compromised Supreme Court might respect. (And even that is not a given: I wouldn’t put it past them to say that any amendment not passed by a Founding Father is invalid, or something).
So the first thing that needs to be done is to “pack” the court. (I prefer the term “unfuck”, but that is less PC). This can only be done if Democrats take the Presidency and both houses of Congres, and nuke the filibuster. But it’s that important. Dial the fucker up to 13, then go to Republicans and say “OK, now we need to work to fix the courts together. You can decline, but if you do you will watch Momala appoint 4 additional justices under the old rules, to lifetime terms, and bank on getting your own trifecta to re-fuck the Court”.
While we have the amendment process open, we also need to set a limit to how long Congress can deliberate on any appointment, not just SC. Once a President makes an appointment, the Senate shouldn’t be able to sit on it indefinitely. It should be guaranteed to get a vote in the full Senate within X legislative days. The Senate can vote it down, of course, but then the President can nominate someone else. Republican Senators challenged Obama to make a centrist pick for the SC, and he did. Mitch and Lindsey sat on it for months because they knew that it would pass if it went to the full Senate. This process basically gives the Senate Leader a veto over both the President and the will of the overall Senate, and cannot be what the Founders intended.
The trick with an amendment is even if you get the House and Senate, you still face ratification from the states.
So 38 out of 50 state legislatures need to ratify the amendment.
To put that in perspective… in 2020, Biden and Trump split the states evenly. 25/25, Biden also took D.C.
To get to 38, you’d need ALL 25 Biden states + 13 Trump states.
Even getting all 25 Biden states isn’t guaranteed because of those, 6 have Republican controlled state houses.
So now you’re looking at needing as many as 19 Trump states?
Exactly. The path to an amendment is super difficult, and Conservative states have no incentive to do so while they have so thoroughly captured the Supreme Court. That’s why you pack the Court first. Appoint 4 liberal justices in their early 40s to lifetime appointments, and you will see much more of a push from those Conservative states for reforms.
The democrats have no intention of getting this to pass. They just want to use it to get out the vote. The constitutional ammendment process was created to expect both parties to work together, that just isn’t the way things are anymore. So passing a constitutional ammendment is pretty much impossible.
Right. The only way to get Republicans to consider an amendment is to make the status quo untenable to them, so they prefer change.
That’s why you pack the court with 4 40-yr-old Liberals who can use the current rules to push the Court leftward for 30+ years . That will get them to change the rules quickly.
I’m not from the US so sorry if this is a dumb question, but why would this push the court leftwards for 30+ years? Wouldn’t the republicans just pack the court at the next opportunity to swing it back in their favour?
Appointing a justice can be very difficult to do if your party doesn’t control the Senate. If Democrats control the Senate or the presidency, then Republicans won’t be able to stack the court.
Packing the court requires an act of Congress, which the President would then need to sign. So it’s not practical to do in a partisan fashion unless one party has the Presidency and both Houses of Congress. If Democrats get that in the next Congress, and expand the Court, then Republicans need to win them all back at the same time to mess with it.
And without an amendment, the only practical way to mess with the court is to increase it.
Yeah, but then the dems won’t want the change since they control the court at that point. Both sides are in this for themselves, that is the nature of a system based on popularity.
The constitutional amendment system was created without parties in mind at all.
Unless it’s to patch a massive oversight in the Constitution like the 25th amendment.
Or to prevent Congress from raising their own salaries with immediate effect, like with the 27th amendment.
I think demonstrating how this is a massive oversight first will get MANY states on board with fixing the supreme court.
The last ammendment was in 92. The political landscape has changed since then. Both sides run mainly on opposing the other, which means bipartisan anything is very unlikely. They couldn’t even pass an immigration reform bill because the conservatives didn’t want to give Biden a win. This would be even harder.
As a non-American, what does it mean to “nuke the filibuster”?
The US Senate only has 100 members (2 per state), and since the body is so small they pride themselves on not limiting debates there. But at some point they do need to decide to progress to a vote, and to do that someone makes a “cloture” motion to close debate on that issue and proceed to a vote. In the US Senate, a cloture motion needs 60 votes to pass.
What this means is that if a minority wants to kill a bill, all they need to do is maintain 41 votes against ending debate. It can never proceed to a vote, then, even if more than 50 Senators are in favor. This is what we call a fillibuster: when enough Senators prevent a measure from being voted on.
This filibuster is just a Senate rule, though, and can be removed by a simple majority vote of the Senate. In the current Democratic majority, though, there were just enough Senators who didn’t want to nuke the rule to keep it in place. They are leaving, though, so if Democrats retain the Senate they will probably have the votes to change the rule.
The drawback is that someday, Republicans will take back the Senate, and if there is no filibuster Democrats in the Minority will have lost a key tool to gum up a Republican majority. But the SC is more important than all that. We need to reform the court ASAP, no matter the political cost.
Democrats in the Minority will have lost a key tool to gum up a Republican majority
Quick, name the last time Democrats with a Senate minority actually used the filibuster to block the Republican agenda. Whereas Republicans only have to threaten to filibuster (and not actually stand there talking for days on end) to block the Democratic agenda.
I mean, it didn’t succeed, but they tried: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neil_Gorsuch_Supreme_Court_nomination#Filibuster
They tried when they didn’t have control of the Senate, but didn’t end the filibuster when they did have control… weird.
I have absolutely no experience or stakes in this, but from my outside perspective, I doubt a Republican majority would keep the filibuster themselves once it’s an advantage to the Democrats. That trust to not abuse it and have it not be abused against you has been completely eroded in the past years.
eroded
That’s putting it mildly. I’d say “obliterated”.
Remove it as an an option.
Right now, any one senator can stop a vote on any bill by announcing they filibuster it.
That used to (decades ago) require them to stand and talk as long as they were able, to delay voting on the bill.
Now without the “talking filibuster” requirement, it becomes trivially easy for any senator to stop anything they don’t like.A filibuster can be broken, and a vote can be forced to happen, if 60 of the 100 senators agree to it.
That almost never happens, as no one party ever gets a 60 seat “super-majority”.Removing the filibuster will allow most any bill to pass with a standard 51% majority.
Stopping the minority party from blocking everything they don’t like.The rules of the Senate itself can be changed with with a simple 51% majority, since they aren’t Laws that govern the land.
So it is possible to eliminate the filibuster without requiring a filibuster breaking super-majority.Ok. I understand now. Thank you for the explanation.
One of the ways to stall a bill is to talk about it forever. Here’s the wiki explaining it.
Technically speaking the filibuster is only acceptable because the rules of congress allow them, but the rules are changed and Agreed on by all members every year. So “nuke the filibuster” would mean to disallow it in the procedural rules of congress.
There is an old army manual that says if you are ever forced to work for the enemy, try to push as many things as possible into committee decisions, because it looks like its helping, but also slows everything down to a crawl/halt.
Exactly. Biden is still playing by the old rulebook.
I prefer the term “unfuck”, but that is less PC
Unfortunately, it is impossible to be unfucked. Nobody can ever unfuck you.
I don’t know I unfuck things almost as frequently as I fuck them up so…
Momala. haha, love it.
I don’t get it.
Harris’s stepkids call her “Momala”. I think she needs to lean into the nickname, particularly since the couchfucker is implying she is somehow unqualified because she doesn’t have kids of her own.
Kamala, Momala
If these reforms actually get implemented, Biden’s legacy will be enshrined as one of the most positively influential presidents ever.
If only he didn’t have the blemish of the Israel situation on his record, which (to be fair) he’s inherited-but has not handled well at all. I’m sure it’s way more complicated than what we know, but no matter what, it’s a bad thing to have attached to his legacy.
Biden did not “inherit” the Israel situation. He made it a core part of his political career to be a staunch supporter of Zionism, ethnic cleansing and genocide against Palestinians.
This is Biden in 1986 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FYLNCcLfIkM
“Where there not an Israel, the US would have to invent an Israel”
Biden has always been driven by a desire to cause destabilization and war in the Middle East, killing millions of people through various US policies and invasions during his long political career.
I think the term is used here to indicate that Israel is a core part of America’s foreign policy, and regardless of who the president is, they have to deal with that legacy.
If Biden just stumbled into politics 15 years ago, maybe one could say that. But he made staunch support for Israel integral to his political career for over 40 years. And he also didn’t hold back on the “why”. It is to serve US interests which for the Middle East have been destabilization and brutal violence.
Regardless of who the president is, regardless of their time in politics, or their influence on foreign policy, the United States of America has shown again and again that it supports Israel in everything that it does. 40 years ago Joe Biden took a 40 year old idea and ran with it.
Up to 180,000 Palestinian deaths isn’t complicated. Btw, it’s a Tuesday in America.🇺🇸
US has sent Israel thousands of 2,000-pound bombs since Oct. 7
Not really complicated. That’s why Irish MEP Clare Daly called him “Butcher Biden” and said he dishonors the legacy of his ancestors. It seems many Irish-Americans agree.
I’m for the changes, but I’m skeptical about whether anything can be accomplished. If the SC changes aren’t done as an amendment, they’ll be subject to SC review. Getting anything past either of those bars seems nigh impossible.
Similarly, if the SC rules that presidential immunity is implied in the constitution, they could also block that without an amendment.
Maybe the plan isn’t to succeed but just to establish a record that Republican lawmakers are good with a supreme executive and corrupt courts, but I sort of feel like they’ve all but said that aloud anyway.
ETA:
But while we’re on the subject of changing things, I wonder about after an 18 year term is up, if there would be any use for a sort of Justice Emeritus who doesn’t get a vote, but can write concurring/dissenting opinions and maybe serve in either an advisory or ethics review capacity. So keep the lifetime appointment with all the advantages of that, but allow for the actual sitting court to change more over time. I don’t know; I haven’t really fleshed out the idea because it’s a pipe dream at this point.
Getting them on record could aid in impeachment. That would require congressional majority, but would also get Congress on record.
This may be more about exposure and transparency than success.
That’s my take.
Barring some kind of miracle it’s just a public demonstration of the corruption.
Term limits should be 6 years or less. 18 is just too much to allow for
18 years requires that the entire Court takes 3-6 administrations to swap out, and is the shortest term in which a single President can’t replace a majority of the justices.
With 6-year SCOTUS terms a 2-term President can select 100% of the justices on the Court, and would have a majority in their first term. It would completely remove the check against the Executive.
Yeah, at the proposed rate the court would be comprised of:
- 1 justice appointed by Bush Jr
- 4 justices appointed by Obama
- 2 justices appointed by Trump
- 2 justices appointed by Biden
So you’d have a 6-3 liberal leaning court. Which makes sense since Democrats have held the presidency for 12 of the last 18 years.
For SCOTUS I think the idea is to have an opening every 2 years. I can see the argument in favor of replacing them at about that rate. But maybe 1 per year is better. Regardless, I’d like to see the SCOTUS openings be more predictable and frequent.
18 years is perfect. It’s the shortest term in which a single Predisent can’t replace a majority of the justices.
Yeah that occurred to me after I posted my comment. Seems perfect to me, too.
9 years means a 2 term president gets 8 people on the court. That’s a terrifying prospect.
Yep agreed
I think it makes sense if you want stability where there’s always 4 senior judges with 10+ years experience.
And even better if we combine this with strict ethics rules where we can be sure any new Tomas etc. gets the boot.
if he really wants to hit republicans in every race, then run on the fact that republicans are talking out of both sides of their mouths when they claim presidents above 80 are too old to run but they seem ok with supreme court justices to essentially live their entire lives on the court.
18 years is a bit steep but glad it’s even being pushed in the first place
Huh I’ve been saying this for years. Even commented it a while back on lemmy. hope they can get it through but don’t have super high hopes unless the next couple of election cycles lean heavily towards the Democrats.
It has nothing to do with election cycles, it must be bipartisan because it’s a constitutional amendment that requires ratification. You need one election cycle to pass it in the house and Senate than a long political slog to get it ratified.
Well it has something to do with election cycles cause Republicans will block this every way they can. So the only way for it to even have a shot is for Democrats to take both the House and Senate with a 2/3 majority to be able to make a constitutional amendments. I sincerely doubt that would happen. After that it would take a very long political slog to ratification. Which again, I don’t have high hopes for it to get through the States.
Election cycles are how people get elected, so it has a lot to do with election cycle leaning very heavily towards the Democrats for it to not be DOA. Then it has a long uphill battle to get it ratified by the states. To say that it has a slim chance of going anywhere is really overstating the chances of it happening.
That hasn’t happened since 1977 so don’t get your hopes up.
Why wouldn’t this have bipartisan support other than the sobbingly obvious ways that it prevents consolidation of power?
Sounds like a good plan!
18 years is too long, IMO. That’s 4.5 presidential terms. 10 makes more sense to me. But I’ll be happy if they can get anything done re: SCOTUS scum.
You want it to be long enough to retain some of the advantages of lifetime appointments. It wasn’t originally framed that way just for fun or convenience, it does have importance.
We also need to make sure they don’t need to go job hunting after their term limit is up, as that would incentivize corruption. They should retain their salary for life.
edit: Reading another comment in here, perhaps its important to note that the main advantage of the lifetime appointment is it allows Justices to be fearless. They can challenge the most powerful people in the entire country, because for their whole lifetime they need nothing more than their current job, which is guaranteed.
Yeah, so the lifetime appointment thing is true right now and it turns out enables corruption. Perhaps the original justifications behind lifetime appointments were just, in fact, bad?
More that something like corruption is impossible to completely prevent. So you just try to make it harder by reducing incentives. We can’t get to “perfect” in a world with humans in it, but “better” is a realistically attainable achievement.
Okay, but it’s not being prevented at all. The current system incentivizes corruption because, clearly, it is practically impossible to do anything about justices who have succumbed to that corruption. So within the context of an environment where billionaires can dump limitless money on a justice and the constituents of that justice can do nothing at all to recall them or even really reprimand them in any way, how is that not asking for corruption to happen?
Biden’s proposals also includes an enforceable code of ethics to address corruption on the bench. And as Carrolade mentions, Congress can impeach and remove judges.
Biden’s proposals also includes an enforceable code of ethics to address corruption on the bench.
From the article:
The president also called for stricter, enforceable rules on conduct which would require justices to disclose gifts, refrain from political activity, and recuse themselves from cases in which they or their spouses have financial interest.
If they aren’t being removed and imprisoned for the kind of activity we see from, say, justice Thomas then the code of ethics isn’t strict enough.
and as Carrolade mentions, Congress can impeach and remove judges.
How many times has that happened in history? If the standard is set such that enforcement is practically impossible to reach, then the rules supposedly being enforced practically don’t exist.
Well said. There’s a strong tendency for people to revere tradition and the constitution a little too much. They forget that our democracy is old (as far as modern democracies go). The constitution was set up by a bunch of wealthy landowners (and some of them were slaveholders). It’s a collection of pretty bad compromises that had to be amended 27 times…and now is practically impossible to amend.
Supreme Court Justice is a very important and respectable position, but there’s nine of them (for now) because one person can’t be trusted with too much power. I think it should be limited even further. We give them too much veneration and power under the current system. Treating these people as infallible demigods is what got us into this mess to begin with.
There actually is a method provided for justice removal, it just takes Congress, which also features corruption unfortunately. Also, just because there is some corruption evident does not mean it is not being prevented at all. Are all 9 corrupt? That would eventually happen if it was not prevented at all.
Importantly though, short term limits would also not prevent corruption, and would probably increase it, as Justices would become much more interested in joining businesses and lobbying organizations after their tenures are up. Hence, a middle ground is probably smarter.
I think the justification is very good, but the actual implementation came with unforeseen consequences. Making the terms much shorter would make the court more like a second legislature, which defeats much of the original purpose. Having18-year terms is a good compromise.
I’d also like to have spelled-out ethics requirements and a lower bar for impeachment, but OTOH I don’t think either of those things would have prevented the current mess, because the rely on the Senate to act in good faith, and we know Republicans will never vote to impeach one of their own judges not matter how corrupt they may be.
We don’t need “fearless” justices we need justices who respect neutrality and understand that no one is above the law, including them.
If you can think of a good way to guarantee that in a world where people can lie, I’m all ears.
After if they don’t retire they can go back to a circuit or something.
There’s no meaningful difference for “fearlessness” between a lifetime appointment and a set term. If they were up for a “reelection” of sorts, then that’d be something to worry about.
It’s about future prospects, assuming that once someone retires from a court position, they may want to do something else with their life asides fully retire. Only by ensuring the court appointment is permanent can you fully address that singular issue.
Note, I am not saying lifetime appointments are good or necessary, only that this is why they exist. It is not a pointless thing we should just thoughtlessly do away with, without taking these other things into account in some fashion. I think a lifetime salary would be a viable solution personally.
Hmm. Why not set also set a retirement age? Are there any rules for what happens if a judge gets early onset Alzheimer’s or something?
That number is way too high, it should be 8 years, the maximum amount even a president is allowed to serve.
I thought the intent was to keep the number at 9 while still having elections every 2 years. Doesn’t that come out to 18?
Exactly what I was going to say. Curse you and your family for saying it ahead of me. Also up vote.
18?! Try 8.
You won’t even get 50
He had 4 years, two of which we had the numbers…
It’s just a lot of Dems didn’t want to get rid of the fillibuster.
Having a D by your name isn’t enough, we need to elect Dems to those seats who are actually willing to fight.
Term limits on SCJ would take a constitutional amendment, so no we haven’t had the numbers.
We didn’t have the numbers. The Senate was 50 Republicans, 48 Democrats, 2 Independents. 2 of the Democrats (Manchin and Sinema) flipped to I.
So 50-46-4. And Manchin and Sinema refused to touch the filibuster.
Not saying there wouldn’t be more, but at least two Democrats are Republicans who ran under D and sabotaged several democratic agendas.
It would have been great to have the Democrats tow the party line and pass more meaningful legislation, but corrupt politicians gotta corrupt.
but at least two Democrats are Republicans who ran under D and sabotaged several democratic agendas.
So did Joe and the DNC fall for it?
Or were they lying when they said 50 was enough for the party platform?
Hell, four years ago Joe was saying he could get Republican senators to vote for the Dem platform
It would have been great to have the Democrats tow the party line and pass more meaningful legislation, but corrupt politicians gotta corrupt.
Dont tell me. Go tell the DNC who defends them, but hangs progressives out to dry and even supports their challengers.
He’d have to be a stronger leader to pull that off. But you’re right, it starts at the bottom. Elect progressives to local positions, and that becomes the foundation of the party. It’s precisely what conservatives have I been doing for 50 years.
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If Biden were a strong leader, he could challenge his party and his followers to do the hard things. He could make a persuasive argument, rally the masses, and convince people that it is in their best interest to do what he wants to do. A strong leader would do the right thing, even if they might lose.
It’s much easier to motivate your followers if they are all narcissistic bigots, of course.
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I don’t expect him to win every fight. I’m really fucking tired of hearing about how we can’t be fighting battles because we’ll lose. The point is to engage in the debate. You’re not going to convince your enemy, but you can drain their public support and bolster your own. So many progressive oolicies have languished in the Democrat doldrums of “We don’t have a super-majority so we’re not even going to try” for decades.
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I’m not mad at him for that. I’m mad at him for not pushing on climate change, or income inequality, or corporate real estate monopolies, or any number of other issues on which Biden and the Democrats have been slow walking half measure platitudes.
Anyone know where 18 years came from? 3 appointments per Senate term? 9 Congressional terms for 9 justices? 4.5 presidential terms?
One would think you’d want it to be an even number of presidential terms, so every president gets one appointment per term or whatever. Otherwise you open yourself up to Garland-esque shenanigans by the Senate.
Because there are 9 justices, so there would be a new appointment every 2 years, giving every presidential term two appointments. So it will exactly avoid all that shit this way.
Historically, the average SC Justice has served about 16 years. 18 seems like a good length to eliminate the extreme cases without affecting the majority.
9 judges, one changed out every 2 years. Not one administration gets more than 4 nominations.
I want to first point out term limits are necessary and I think we need more term limits!
However 18yrs does seem just a bit too short, maybe closer to 24 or 30yr so it can span an entire “normal” career length. Keep in mind the idea of these lifetime appointments is so you dont spend years of college and your youth learning boring law stuff only to be able to keep a job for a few years. Imagine going to college, training in law for years, only to know after 18yrs you will have to go back to regular attorney work
Having guaranteed career tenures is solely there to incentivize younger people to become a justice
The supreme court is a position you normally get nominated to after years of service in the Judicial Service, they should already have 10-15 years as a judge or law professor. That should get them to retirement age.
Did Thomas even serve as a judge before he was the token nomination?
For 19 months, he also had chaired the EEOC for 9 years before that, after working in the Department of Education for 1 year.
He’s quite possibly had the fastest tracked career I’ve ever looked into. Every fast tracked career advancement he’s had has been at the hands of republicans.
Nobody goes from college to SCOTUS, and the whole point is to have turnover so they don’t clog up the highest court for a quarter century.
Hell, they could argue cases in front of SCOTUS after serving!
There is no saying they couldn’t go down to district court level and continue to serve. It would also be possible to make a solid living getting paid to do speeches at various schools and institutions.
They could also be able to step in to hear individual cases if a justice has to recuse due to a conflict, or if there is a vacancy due to some other reason.
Exactly, nobody is going from SCOTUS back to entry-level judicial work.
The appointment should be the culimination of a reputable legal career, not handed out to foundation-approved ideologues to sit on for 30 years at a time; getting too comfortable and losing touch with societal norms.
And to clarify our justices know this and have taken advantage of the system. So change IS needed to modernize the judicial branch
Education is easier and more accessible now than ever before. And you dont really need to pass bar or have law degree to be a justice
Having life-tenure is not to incentivize people to do it. It’s to make them resistant to outside influence. If you’re going to be out of a job in x years, then it behoves you to make some friends. If your job is guaranteed for life, you need no friends.
It’s no different from tenured professorships. The job guarantee gives them the freedom to conduct research that will piss off even very powerful people without retaliation.
And the model I saw proposed would grant them senior status and thus maintain pay as if they were actively sitting.
Paying them to do nothing post term is a very very cheap solution to protect democracy.
The problem is (even currently) they want more money than is being paid directly by the federal govt.
You don’t just graduate college and apply for a job on the supreme court. You have to first make a name for yourself as an experienced judge and then get appointed by a President. So we don’t need an incentive for younger people to become a justice, since they aren’t out there applying to get picked.
Additionally, the average tenure right now is only 16 years. So if you think 18 years is too short, then you might want to bring that up with the people who keep quitting early.
So they would have it just like everybody else? What’s wrong with that?
It’s 18 years because we have 9 justices, and if we want to make terms expire on a regular basis we need to tie it to the size of the Court.
But guess what? If you pack the court to 13, then the math makes the term 26 years. Much more reasonable, right? I prefer a shorter term , so after the court is packed I would advocate for 13 year terms, renewable once. But I would accept 26 year terms, too.
As others have clarified the 18 year is just about (or is) appropriate. I do think we will see an influx of younger court justices (hopefully!) and having an appealing career tenure would ideally incentivize younger folks persuing that position
Imagine going to college, training in law for years, only to know after 18yrs you will have to go back to regular attorney work
What makes you think they’d go back to regular attorney work? They can still be judges, just not on the Supreme Court. And if you’re worried that serving on the Supreme Court for 18 years isn’t enough of a reward in itself, we could also continue to pay them their Supreme Court salary for life.
Supreme court justice is not an entry level position.
I don’t see why someone couldn’t be appointed to a second (or even third) term on the Supreme court. The point is to make the court less succeptible to fluctuation by packing, not increase them.
And why wouldn’t they go back to regular attorney work? They could take a post on a Circut court or a state Supreme/Superior court. It’s not as if their entire career will be expunged after their term ends so they have to start as if they’d just graduated Law school.
