Once upon a time, a fellow named Mitch, a Republican who happened to be the Senate majority leader, decided that despite a few centuries of tradition and principle, he would create a new way of doing things. It wasn’t even a rule, just a principle that said a sitting president could expect a vote in the U.S. Senate to confirm his or her chosen Supreme Court candidate in order to fill an empty seat.

Mitch, at the time, declared that because the vacancy in question occurred during a presidential election year, the Senate confirmation of the candidate must wait until after the next administration took office.

And that was that. The sitting president’s historical right to fill a vacant Supreme Court seat was snatched away. There were 269 days until the coming election, but Mitch thought it was just too close. Of course, he was hoping that the person who won the coming election would be a member of his party, not the party of the current president, a Democrat.

Lucky for Mitch, that’s just what happened. Yes, his preferred candidate won that election and became the new president. One of his first acts as president was to fill the stolen and still empty Supreme Court seat. Now that the power to do this was back in the hands of Mitch’s party, the new president nominated someone of a very conservative nature.

But to get this nominee confirmed, Mitch had to use his superpowers again. This time he didn’t just change a century’s long principle. No, this time he changed an actual Senate rule. You see, in the Senate they talk a lot during the confirmation process for a Supreme Court nominee. To stop the chatter, a vote of at least 60 senators is required, which Mitch did not have. That’s the cloture rule.

Mitch said, well, to heck with that rule, let’s go with 51 senators to stop all that talking and get to the actual confirmation vote! And that was enough to get the new president’s nominee confirmed for the stolen seat that rightfully belonged to the previous president’s nominee.

As time passed, another Supreme Court seat opened up and the new president chose a candidate, a conservative, of course, who though very controversial, still managed to be confirmed. After all, Mitch’s party now only needed a simple majority of 51 senators to see the confirmation through.

And then, another seat, a third, became available a mere 45 days before the next presidential election. Remember, Mitch had declared, absolutely, that a Supreme Court nominee cannot be confirmed during a presidential election year. He’d never ignore his own new principle, would he?

Well, of course he would and did. Mitch used his superpowers once more and tossed that no-seat-in-an-election-year principle right out the window. The new Supreme Court justice received her confirmation just seven days before the nation voted on who would be the next president — though in many states early voting had been going on for weeks.

So, that’s the story of how the current Supreme Court ended up with six conservative justices and only three liberal justices. Of course, if the rules and principles that are the foundation of our democracy had been respected, the conservatives would have only a one-vote majority of 5-4, rather than the harder to overcome 6-3 majority they have now.

That one vote matters.

Last year’s egregious overturning of Roe v Wade, the 50-year-old settled ruling that had given women the constitutional right to reproductive freedom, squeaked by with a 5-4 conservative majority. That’s because one of those six conservative justices switched sides and voted with the liberal justices against killing Roe. The Supreme Court seat that Mitch stole would have made all the difference and Roe would still be in place today.

Who knows, perhaps with the addition of one more liberal and one less conservative voice on the court, this extremist court majority might not have ended affirmative action in higher education or ruled against President Joe Biden’s order to cut student loan debt. Or have ruled in favor of a woman who might someday add wedding websites to her design business. For religious reasons, she did not want her state government to force her to work with same-sex couples.

The Supreme Court is now back to ruling that separate is equal once again. How can this be happening?

There’s been a lot of discussion about expanding the number of justices on the Supreme Court beyond the current nine, say to 13. It’s not like it hasn’t been done before. It has, several times. Importantly, the Constitution is silent about what the right number should be, so it’s just a matter of getting the Congress to act and the president to agree.

That would certainly change the balance in favor of less extreme rulings. If we cannot count on the other party to do what’s right when they have the power to do so, then we must legislate a solution to fix the problem.

So, please make your voice heard. Call your House representative and your senators and make them understand what’s at stake. And vote!

Karen Gardner of Haydenville can be reached at opinion@gazettenet.com.

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