U.S. Rep. Hank Johnson (D-GA-04) said members of the public should prepare for several Congressional hearings where he and other elected officials will pitch their case for increasing the number of U.S. Supreme Court justices.
Johnson chairs the U.S. House of Representatives’ Courts and Intellectual Property Subcommittee. Staff at the Decatur-based website Decaturish.com interviewed Johnson this week in a question-and-answer-style format. The congressman said expanding the number of seats on the U.S. Supreme Court “will…gather support as we make the case for reform in the justice system.”
“The courts are not equipped to handle today’s flow of cases. The Supreme Court has been set at nine since 1869. That’s 152 years ago. It’s gone through seven changes in size since the nation was founded. What’s happened since that time, the nation’s population has increased. The flow of commerce has increased,” the website quoted Johnson as saying.
“The amount of criminal activity has increased. The law has become more complex, because [the] session of Congress sees new laws placed on the books that oftentimes have to be enforced in the courts. The court itself has not kept up with that pace of change. Now is the time to correct the imbalance and establish a court that has greater capacity to render justice.”
Two other members of Georgia’s Congressional delegation, meanwhile, are currently co-sponsoring a resolution in the U.S. House of Representatives that addresses additional U.S. Supreme Court justices. That resolution proposes an amendment to the U.S. Constitution to prevent any act that increases the number of justices on the Supreme Court from taking effect for 10 years following its enactment. U.S. Rep. Rick Allen (R-GA-12) and U.S. Rep. Austin Scott (R-GA-08) are two of the resolution’s 11 co-sponsors.
Members of the Georgia House of Representatives, meanwhile submitted a resolution in January that asks the U.S. Congress “to reject any and all actions to increase the number of justices on the United States Supreme Court.” The five legislators, in their resolution, said changing the number of justices on the court undermines its independence. They also said an independent court “is an essential and fundamental element of the United States’ system of checks and balances that protects our Constitutional rights.”
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Chris Butler is an investigative journalist at The Tennessee Star. Follow Chris on Facebook. Email tips to [email protected].
