The writer is president of the United States.
First, I am calling for a constitutional amendment called the No One Is Above the Law Amendment. It would make clear that there is no immunity for crimes a former president committed while in office. I share our Founders’ belief that the president’s power is limited, not absolute. We are a nation of laws — not of kings or dictators.
Second, we have had term limits for presidents for nearly 75 years. We should have the same for Supreme Court justices …
Third, I’m calling for a binding code of conduct for the Supreme Court. …
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So, the maximum amount of time that a person could be President is 10 years, right? Take over from VP position halfway through a term, then elected twice?
My instinct is that a 10-year limit on SC positions would be too short. However, for a longer length of office, there would need to be a method of removal, such as an election. Maybe an election for the spot every 5 years, with a 3-term limit?
I would fear the same pendulum swinging we currently see in executive institutions like the FCC.
Rather than term limits, we should just eliminate the fixed size of the court. When a justice dies or retires, we don’t fill their seat. The president appoints a new justice every two years, at the end of the first and third years of their term, without regard to the current size of the court.
If the court somehow gets too small, we don’t allow the president additional appointments. Instead, we establish a line of succession: the 13 chief judges on the circuit courts, in order of seniority, are automatically elevated to keep the size of the court from falling below 7.
And to prevent the Senate from playing games with nominees, these 13 chief judges are pre-confirmed to the SCOTUS line of succession: they do not need to be reconfirmed should the president choose one as a biennial appointment.