If . . ., the people will have ceased to be their own rulers

[David Lockmiller]

The other Supreme Court fight

Jamelle Bouie, a Times Opinion columnist, has explained how Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln both fought their political opponents’ attempts to lock in power through the courts.

“If the policy of the Government upon the vital questions affecting the whole people is to be irrevocably fixed by the decisions of the Supreme Court,” Lincoln said in his first inaugural address, “the people will have ceased to be their own rulers.”