The latest on the 85th Session

This builds on the post below about dark money in Texas campaigns.

Legislators are already nervous about the next biennial budget.

- Lawmakers have mixed feelings about 2017 session.

“I think our focus will be largely on budget issues,” said Price who is also a member of several other House committees, including Human Services, a mental health panel he chairs, and Calendars, an influential committee that decides which bills go to the House floor for a vote.

“If the economy performs as we anticipate for the remaining of the year, beginning with the next session we will likely have less revenue to work with,” he said. “That will drive a lot of the policy work and policy decisions that we make in the 85th legislative session.”

Other legislators and statewide officials have similar concerns.

State Comptroller Glenn Hegar recently told nervous members of the Senate Finance Committee that though the Texas economy is more diversified than it was during the oil bust of the 1980s, in 2014 nearly 14 percent of the gross state product came from oil and gas revenues.

“So, I suspect that the Appropriations Committee and the Senate Finance Committee will be very busy, both during this interim and in the next session,” Price said.
Other legislators also see the 2017 session shaping up now that most legislative races have been decided.

“This helps us a great deal,” said Rep. Ken King, R-Canadian, who didn’t draw an intraparty challenger or a Democratic opponent either.

“Obviously school finance will remain on the radar,” King, a member of the House Public Education Committee, said in reference to the lawsuit more than 600 school districts filed against the state four and a half years ago. The lawsuit is pending in the Texas Supreme Court and a ruling is expected any day now.

“Health care issues, transportation will always be there and the coffers will be a little less full than they were last session,” said King who also sits on three other House panels, including Calendars.

For Rep. John Frullo, R-Lubbock, the only member from the Texas Panhandle and South Plains delegation who drew a primary challenger but has no Democratic opponent in November, other issues shaping up include hailstorm insurance, public and higher education, economic development and transportation.

From the San Antonio Express-News: 'Dark money' disclosure fight heading back to the Texas Legislature

An early indication of what might be on the legislative agenda come January;

- Click here for the article.

AUSTIN — A top House lawmaker who led the charge to require politically active nonprofits to reveal their donors, a lightning rod issue opposed by Gov. Greg Abbott, says he wants Texas voters to decide the issue at the ballot box.

State Rep. Byron Cook, a Republican from Corsicana who narrowly won re-election earlier this month, said he is planning to propose next legislative session an amendment to the state constitution on the issue of disclosing so-called "dark money" donors.

A proposal to prevent politically active nonprofits from shielding the identities of their donors ended up tanking a comprehensive ethics bill last year. The House added the disclosure requirement to the Legislature's biggest ethics measure of the session, but the amended proposal was rejected by Lt. Gov Dan Patrick and the Senate.

Given that backdrop, Cook's proposal already is being cast by campaign finance reformers as more than a long shot. It would require approval from two-thirds of lawmakers in both chambers before it could be placed on a ballot for Texas voters.

But it appears to be the only gambit available to skirt Abbott's veto pen for Cook and lawmakers pushing for political nonprofit disclosure. The governor does not have the power to nullify a joint resolution proposing amendments to the state constitution. 

"It's a priority bill for the state of Texas," Cook, the chairman of the powerful House State Affairs Committee, said in an interview. "If we don't help give transparency to this issue, there'll be no reason for any candidate to do anything other than set up vehicles to allow them to receive money anonymously."

Most politically active nonprofits are allowed to spend money to influence elections independent of candidates but do not have to reveal who is funding the efforts (527 groups are required to disclose donors). The nonprofits, mostly 501(c)4s, have argued their donor lists are constitutionally protected.

Campaign cash from politically active nonprofits that do not disclose donors represents just a fraction of the hundreds of millions of dollars flowing into Texas elections. Some lawmakers, including Cook, have warned that the growing number of groups spending anonymous campaign cash in state elections could eventually lead to a major scandal.

The topic has become the most divisive campaign finance issue for the Legislature going back to 2013, when former Gov. Rick Perry vetoed a dark money disclosure measure authored by Republican state Sen. Kel Seliger. Last year's debate ended in the complete collapse of an emergency item for Abbott: ethics reform.

After the legislative session ended, Abbott signaled clearly how the state's top leader views the issue.

"As a justice on the Texas Supreme Court, I wrote that laws like that are unconstitutional and I based that decision on United States Supreme Court decisions," Abbott said at a news conference last year. "It's important for legislators to not to try and pass laws that have already been ruled unconstitutional."

Cook said given the political climate at the Legislature he believes the next logical step is to take the issue to Texas voters.

Details of the proposal are still being worked out, he said, but it could draw from a bill he authored last year that required groups making independent expenditures of $25,000 or more to disclose the names of donors who give $2,000 or more.

"This is an extremely important issue and only becoming more and more topical, as more groups move toward secretly funding campaigns, which is going to undermine transparency," he said. "We should make a serious effort to make sure the public is aware of who is behind the message with respect to political campaigns."

However, even supporters of campaign finance reform are largely skeptical that Cook's initiative will gain traction. Craig McDonald, director of the left-leaning watchdog group Texans for Public Justice, said "there's too much political clout lined up against transparency in elections."

"Keeping attention on the exploding use of dark money is laudable," said McDonald. "Getting a disclosure amendment to the ballot in the face of active opposition from the governor and lieutenant governor is politically impossible."

Authoritarian Populism

That's term the authors of the Monkey Cage use to describe the Trump phenomenon. They think it is a growing trend.

- It’s not just Trump. Authoritarian populism is rising across the West. Here’s why.

Populist authoritarianism can best be explained as a cultural backlash in Western societies against long-term, ongoing social change.

Over recent decades, the World Values Survey shows that Western societies have been getting gradually more liberal on many social issues, especially among the younger generation and well-educated middle class. That includes egalitarian attitudes toward sex roles, tolerance of fluid gender identities and LGBT rights, support for same-sex marriage, tolerance of diversity, and more secular values, as well as what political scientists call emancipative values, engagement in directly assertive forms ofdemocratic participation, and cosmopolitan support for agencies of global governance.

This long-term generational shift threatens many traditionalists’ cultural values. Less educated and older citizens fear becoming marginalized and left behind within their own countries.

The Full Faith and Credit clause in the news . . .

The case is V.L. v. E.L.

Here is the question presented to the court:

Does the Full Faith and Credit Clause of the Constitution require that the Alabama state courts recognize a Georgia state court’s adoption order?

Here's the court's decision:

The Alabama Supreme Court erred in refusing to grant full faith and credit to a judgment by a Georgia court making a woman the legal parent of the children she had raised with her same-sex partner since birth; the judgment appears on its face to have been issued by a court with jurisdiction and there is no established Georgia law to the contrary.

For detail:

Scotusblog: V.L. v. E.L.
Oyez: V.L. v. E.L.

From 538: When Political Parties Splinter

Since conventional wisdom seems to be that Trump's success indicates a shift is underway between the political parties - one that might be fatal to the Republican Party as we know it today - I'll post what I can find relevant to it. It's timely for our upcoming look at political parties in both 2305 and 2306.

Here's the first. It looks at previous splits in American history - they don't happen all the time, but they are not that rare.

- Click here for the article.

The emerging fight within the Republican Party doesn’t look exactly like any of the major party splits of the past. There’s not a clear issue difference at the center of it. Trump is coming in from outside the party; he’s not a former president like Theodore Roosevelt. And party organizations have changed to place more emphasis onvoter input — one of Roosevelt’s chief goals — even as elites play a significant role in managing conflict among factions. That role may become even more important as we head into the later primaries and the convention.

If the GOP does split, it may be for only one or two election cycles, with Trump playing the role of Roosevelt. It’s also possible, however, that the rise of Trumpism within the Republican Party will alienate the Plains states and interior West. How those states vote during the GOP primary could provide some clues (few have voted so far, but Trump has underperformed in Kansas and Oklahoma). Or maybe if Trump wins the nomination, the #NeverTrumps will sleep on the couch for a couple of months but all will be forgiven by the time the general election rolls around.

Regardless, the mere fact that a party splitting seems so plausible is pretty amazing — it doesn’t happen often.

What impact might Merrick Garland have on the Supreme Court?

This is the subject of the written assignment I'll be giving students as they come back from spring break. Garland's appointment is probably the big news item of the break. If confirmed, he will have a significant impact on the court given who he is replacing, so I'd like students to speculate on the nature of this impact.

2305 students are asked to think about the impact on the court generally, 2306 students are asked to think about what impact it will have on cases involving the state of Texas.

Here are a handful of - hopefully helpful - links:

- Garland Would Influence SCOTUS Encryption, Privacy Cases.
- The Supreme Court’s New Era.
- Is Merrick Garland more conservative than Antonin Scalia on criminal justice issues?
- Is Merrick Garland A Liberal? The Supreme Court Prospect's Political Leanings Could Make Him A Safe Bet.
- Merrick Garland could be an unpredictable vote on high court.
- Merrick Garland raises prospect of a centrist Supreme Court.

These are just a start.

From the NYT: On Trade, Donald Trump Breaks With 200 Years of Economic Orthodoxy

The author sees evidence that he wants the US to adopt mercantilism - the economic system that Britain used way back in colonial days. This marks a radical change in economic policy. It would also drastically increase governmental control of the economy.

- Click here for the article.

. . . Mr. Trump is bringing mercantilism back. The New York billionaire is challenging the last 200 years of economic orthodoxy that trade among nations is good, and that more is better.

He is well on his way to becoming the first Republican nominee in nearly a century who has called for higher tariffs, or import taxes, as a broad defense against low-cost imports. And there is a good chance he would face a Democratic opponent, Hillary Clinton, who has expressed fewer reservations about trade, inverting a longstanding political dynamic.

Among Republican standard-bearers, “There’s nobody since Hoover who talked this way about trade,” said I. M. Destler, a public policy professor at the University of Maryland and the author of “American Trade Politics,” a history. For most of the last century, Mr. Destler said, such skepticism about trade had been relegated to the fringes of the Republican Party.Continue reading the main story

Mr. Trump’s mercantilism is among his oldest and steadiest public positions. Since at least the 1980s, he has described trade as a zero-sum game in which countries lose by paying for imports. The trade deficit with China, which reached $366 billion last year, makes America the biggest loser. “Our trade deficit with China is like having a business that continues to lose money every single year,” Mr. Trump told The Daily News in August. “Who would do business like that?”

The Jefferson Grid

In 2306 we discuss - briefly - the process the nation went through as it acquired territory to the west and then converted it into governing entities. This involved carving territory into one mile squares following a proposal by Thomas Jefferson in the Land Ordinance of 1785. These were the bases of cities and private property. Their influence can be felt today.

One enterprising artsy guy has used Google Earth to see what has become of these squares. As you can see, they are everywhere. You can follow him on Instagram.

- Instagram: The Jefferson Grid.
- CityLab: Photographing the American 'Grid,' One Square Mile Per Frame.
- The Great American Grid: A History of the American Grid in 4 Minutes.
- Wikipedia: Public Land Survey System.

Here's a reason why you don't need to vote

I asked both 2305 and 2306 students whether it was their responsibility vote - yes or no. There was no reason to give a knee-jerk yes answer.

Here's a powerful argument from Salon that you shouldn't:

- Vote for Hillary, be a sucker: It’s OK to reject the choice of a tyrannical liberal or a right-wing tyrant
“Vote for Hillary or be responsible for Trump” is slogan of someone maintaining -- or being played -- by the system.

Nothing generates more insipid analysis than a U.S. presidential election. It’s a wonderful opportunity for two-party functionaries to distill American mythologies into the high-minded diction of corporate wonkery. I suppose it isn’t helpful to complain about election analysis by adding to the babble, but it does seem worthwhile to highlight the limitations of the genre.

I dislike voting as a model of political engagement, especially in a corrupt and constrained system that devalues grassroots organizing and tries to limit our imagination to mechanical support of stage-managed icons. Yet I accept that people find inspiration in public figures and express approval by casting votes, sometimes the only political commodity available to a disempowered public. We can critique U.S. elections without being contemptuous of their participants.

Most election skeptics actually value (and perhaps overvalue) their votes. Pundits who insist on voting as a precondition of respectability exhibit contempt for anybody who rejects the mythologies of U.S. exceptionalism. To be respectable, one mustn’t simply vote. One must vote correctly. Such entreaties preclude third-party candidates or acts of conscience deemed inadequately practical. We remain confined to a political canon that produced the greatest crisis of inequality in world history.

Americans are enamored of the vote as a symbol of collective power. The right to vote certainly shouldn’t be taken for granted, but deification of voting can prevent us from treating ourselves as something grander than a massive focus group curated by a few dozen affluent lickspittles. The mythography of voting has conditioned us to treat mediocrity as superior.

March 15 Primary Results

Click here for results from each state:

- NYT: March 15 Primary Results.

And for commentary:

538: It’s Still Not Clear That Donald Trump Will Get a Majority of Delegates.

From the NYT: Obama to Nominate Merrick Garland to Supreme Court

- Click here for the article.

President Obama on Wednesday will nominate Merrick B. Garland as the nation’s 113th justice, according to White House officials, choosing a centrist appeals court judge widely respected even by Republicans in hopes his choice will be considered by the Senate.

In choosing Judge Garland, a well-known moderate who has drawn bipartisan support over decades, Mr. Obama was essentially daring Republicans to press their election-year confirmation fight over a judge many of them have publicly praised and who would be difficult for them to reject, particularly if a Democrat were to win the November presidential election and they faced the prospect of a more liberal nominee in 2017.

For more on Garland:

- Wikipedia: Merrick Garland.
- Scotusblog: Afternoon round-up: President nominates Garland to Supreme Court.
- Vox: Merrick Garland is President Obama's choice to replace Antonin Scalia on the Supreme Court.

Will the legislature re-regulate college tuition?

The high costs of college make that a possibility.

- Tuition hikes have state leaders looking to regulate college costs.

By the time the state Legislature reconvenes next year, students at the University of Texas at Austin will be paying about $150 more a semester.

The University of Houston will be charging students about $100 more. UT students in San Antonio will see their bills rise by about $160; those in Dallas will be paying even more.

And state lawmakers, watching with frustration as college costs climb, will be looking at whether they should have a say in whether those bills rise.

The tuition hikes approved in recent weeks may prove to be the final straw for lawmakers who decided more than a decade ago to allow colleges to set their own costs. State leaders have chided university presidents and regents who approved the recent increases and on Monday Gov. Greg Abbott announced the creation of a new initiative aimed, in part, at reining in college costs.

An effort in the Legislature last year to regulate tuition gained bipartisan support, though it did not become law. Now, momentum appears to be growing anew to tighten control over tuition at state schools.

"The universities, by increasing tuition, have also increased the prospects of re-regulation come 2017," said Mark P. Jones, a political scientist at Rice University.

It is not just an issue in Texas. As states have slashed higher education funding over the last several years, colleges and universities across the country have leaned more on tuition to cover their costs. Nationally, state funding for public schools decreased by 12 percent overall between 2003 and 2012, and the median tuition at those schools rose 55 percent, according to the U.S. Government Accountability Office.

They backed the wrong horse

You take a risk if you endorse a challenger to a sittign member of the legislature - if you are also a legislator. They might win.

- Analysis: Endorsements, Loyalties — and Getting Things Done.

Endorsements seem harmless enough, but several state senators will have to eat some crow to get their legislation passed next year.

They committed the insiders’ sin of endorsing challengers to sitting members of the Legislature. Worse, their candidates lost, and now they will have to deal with the people they opposed when it comes time to govern.

From outside, where most sane people live, it makes perfect sense to throw your political weight and reputation against candidates with whom you disagree and in favor of the ones you like.

Republicans oppose Democrats, Democrats oppose Republicans. What’s new?

The same tensions exist in party primaries: Endorsers go with the people they think would do the best job, or who they think will be most helpful to them. In the divided Republican Party in particular, the leaders of one faction oppose the candidates from another.

But there are some invisible lines, and Republican state Sens. Paul Bettencourtof Houston, Konni Burton of Colleyville, Bob Hall of Edgewood and Don Huffines of Dallas danced across them this year. Each plunged — or at least dipped their toes — into efforts to unseat Republican House incumbents.

One of those lines is, or was, Ronald Reagan’s 11th Commandment: “Thou shalt not speak ill of any fellow Republican.” That’s more of a historical marker than a real rule— it has more or less gone by the wayside as internal fights in the GOP have intensified.

Legislative tradition is another line: Legislators are in some ways more loyal to their chambers than to their parties. Senators stay out of House business. House members stay out of Senate business.

From the Texas Tribune: Texas Supreme Court Grapples With Billion-Dollar Question

Another issue that might end up on the agenda next session.

- Click here for the article.

With billions of dollars at stake, the Texas Supreme Court heard arguments Tuesday in a tax showdown whose outcome could shake up the next legislative session while straining the historically friendly relationship between state lawmakers and the iconic oil and gas sector.

Throughout a spirited debate over arcane accounting rules and oil-tinged science, the justices offered few clues as to how they might rule.

“They’re all great poker faces,” said James LeBas, an economist with the Texas Oil & Gas Association and a former chief revenue estimator for Texas, following arguments.
The case ultimately focuses on a single question: Are metal pipes, tubing and other equipment used in oil and gas extraction exempt from sales taxes?

Texas Comptroller Glenn Hegar has warned state lawmakers that a yes to that question, brought by Midland-based Southwest Royalties in an appeal of a lower court’s ruling, could trigger a flood of refunds that would wipe out the state’s projected $4 billion budget surplus.

“This one’s as big as they come,” the Republican said ahead of the arguments.

No surprise here. From the Texas Tribune: Texas Near Bottom Among States in Primary Turnout This Year

It's standard fare. We beat Louisiana!

- Click here for the article.

Texas saw record turnout numbersin last week’s presidential primaries, but it still had one of the lowest voting-age participation rates of the states that have held primaries so far.

More than 4.2 million Texans voted in the presidential primary race, the most in state history, according to the Secretary of State. However, among the 12 states that already have held primaries, Texas ranked second to last in voter turnout of residents 18 and older, at 21.5 percent.

The Lone Star State came ahead of only Louisiana, where 17.3 percent of residents of voting age participated in elections there Saturday. Louisiana, unlike Texas, uses a closed system for presidential primaries, meaning a person must be registered as a Democrat or Republican before the election to be able to vote in one of the party's primaries.

Rice University political science professor Mark Jones said low Democratic turnout and Texas’ diverse population accounts for the state's low percentage.

From CityLab: Sanctuary Cities Are Here to Stay Despite tiny policy shifts and official grandstanding, sanctuary cities rest on solid legal ground—and they’re not going anywhere.

A probable agenda item when the legislature meets next January for its 85th session. This is a look at the issue from a national perspective - we have out own take of course.

- Click here for the article.

Nearly seven months ago, the U.S. Department of Justice implemented a small procedural shift in the way it releases federal inmates who are tagged for deportation. Now, when those inmates have warrants out in any state or locality, federal immigration authorities have the first right to detain them and immediately begin deportation proceedings, even before the state or local matter is adjudicated.

It’s a very specific, very technical shift, but it does result in some material changes to the relationship between federal authorities and local ones. Previously, state and local authorities were always first in line—any warrant they issued trumped any immigration detainer, and they could always claim custody of an inmate being released from federal prison to adjudicate their local case. Then, at the end of that adjudication, local authorities could decide whether or not to detain that person for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Cities that have policies limiting cooperation or communication with ICE—often called sanctuary cities—may choose never to detain an inmate for deportation, potentially resulting in that inmate’s release. But now, because of the procedure change, the Federal Bureau of Prisons will directly transfer these inmates to ICE unless the city in question promises to hand them over later.

The change, which was implemented in July 2015, flew largely under the radar until late last week, when Attorney General Loretta Lynch testified about the policy before a House Appropriations subcommittee. It was immediately hailed as a victory by congressional Republicans, particularly SubcommitteeChairman John Culberson of Texas, who thanked her for her cooperation profusely throughout the meeting, and later claimed that he forced DOJ to “take action on sanctuary cities.”

It's not magic. It's data science.

Thst's what Civis Analytics claims anyway.

I'd say this is the future - but it's really the present. And its a reason you might want to take a bunch of stats classes.

- Check it out.

From Slate: John Oliver Explains Our Nation’s “Ghost Governments,” With Help From Some Adorable Kids

We call then special taxing districts.

- Click here for the article.

For those who thought John Oliver’s recent Donald Trump takedownsignaled a potential shift to flashier topics, think again. On Sunday, Oliver once again tackled a story that’s extremely important but at first seems very boring: special tax districts. (At least they have the slightly sexier nickname of “ghost governments.”) You’ve probably heard of fire districts or school districts, but the United States’ special districts spend roughly $100 billion in tax dollars each year—as Oliver points out, that’s billions more than Russia spends on its military—on far more obscure causes: e.g., Litchfield, New Hampshire’s “Mosquito Control District.” Meanwhile, they “can be created seemingly out of thin air,” operate with an obscene lack of oversight, and are very difficult to shut down.

But as with many of the show’s takes on complex or dry topics, Oliver found a way to make this one both simple and entertaining—enlisting the help of some very cute, very articulate schoolchildren to break it down so that anyone could understand it (the kids even do a pretty good impression of Oliver himself).

The video is just below:

Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Special Districts (HBO)

From the Center for American Progress: States of Change The Demographic Evolution of the American Electorate, 1974–2060

A look at the demographic future of the country.

- Click here for the report.

And for a look at interactive maps showing how this future plays out nationally and in each state:

- Click here.

Note that Texas becomes majority Latino in 2044.

From the NYT: Why Donald Trump Has Done Worse in Mostly White States

Apparently whites in states with high populations of minority groups are more responsive to Trumps message. The author speculates about why this may be the case. It has little to do with his stances on issues, and much more with who he targets his wrath towards. Race is central to it.

- Click here for the article.

An appeal to white identity tends to work better in areas where that identity is felt to be under threat. The South, where Mr. Trump has performed well, has long been known for racially polarized politics.

Race essentially predicts political affiliation there, with blacks lining up for Democrats and whites for Republicans. A state like Mississippi, whose population is around 37 percent black, is an obvious example. If even 25 percent of white Mississippians voted for Democrats, the state could tilt blue — and perhaps elect the state’s first black governor, or first black senator since Reconstruction.

Democratic strategists dream of a blue North Carolina and Florida, and further in the future, a blue Georgia or Arizona.

But few dream of a blue Mississippi. The numbers have long been locked in. For example, according to the 2012 Mississippi exit polls, 96 percent of blacks voted for President Obama, but 89 percent of whites voted for Mitt Romney, who won by 55 percent to 44 percent.

Political scientists have written about the importance of tipping points in ethnic strife or resentment around the globe. It occurs when one group grows big enough to potentially alter the power hierarchy.

The author links to a large number of studies. Here are a few:

- RAND Kicks Off 2016 Presidential Election Panel Survey.
- Who Are Donald Trump's Supporters, Really?
- Measuring Donald Trump’s Supporters for Intolerance.
- How political science helps explain the rise of Trump: the role of white identity and grievances.
- Obama's Unwanted Legacy: The Renewed Influence of 'Old-Fashioned Racism'
- Racial Identity, and Its Hostilities, Are on the Rise in American Politics.
- Could America Become Mississippi?
- THE BROWNING OF AMERICA.
- The downside of diversity: A Harvard political scientist finds that diversity hurts civic life.

Chart of the Day

From the Rand Corporation.

- Click here for the source.

Today in Dual Credit - Laws at issue in assigned court cases.

For dual credit this week - a look at some of the laws at issue in the court cases I assigned.


- Voting Rights Act of 1965:

- The Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993.

- The Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993.

- The Anti-terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996.

- Defense of Marriage Act of 1996.

- Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act of 2000.

- Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002.

- Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010.

- Stolen Valor Act of 2013.

From the Washington Post: It’s already looking like a different Supreme Court

Scalia's death is having an impact.

- Click here for the article.

During Wednesday’s hearing on Texas’s abortion restrictions, it was the court’s four liberals who filled the space that Scalia left.

They dominated the session the way Scalia used to do when he cared passionately about a subject. Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ruth Bader Ginsburg all but commandeered the proceeding, ignoring Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr.’s efforts to bring the interrogation to an end.

[Liberal justices unite in arguments over Texas abortion restrictions]

That was a change in style, and there’s more to say about it. But there were also indications that without Scalia to shore up the court’s conservative wing, a shift in the court’s jurisprudence is underway as well.

Dow Chemical, for instance, announced that it would settle a nearly $1 billion antitrust judgment instead of pursuing its plans to take the fight to the high court.

“Growing political uncertainties due to recent events with the Supreme Court and increased likelihood for unfavorable outcomes for business involved in class-action suits have changed Dow’s risk assessment of the situation,” the company said.

[Dow Chemical settles suit because of Supreme Court uncertainty]

Those changed circumstances were apparent in another of the court’s decisions last week.

A month after granting an apparently unprecedented stay to temporarily freeze the Obama administration’s signature regulation on climate change, the court denied a similar request to block a different air-pollution rule.

Roberts rejected a request from Michigan and other Republican-led states to stay the Mercury and Air Toxic Standards rule. The regulation was adopted by the Environmental Protection Agency three years ago to tighten restrictions on a class of harmful pollutants that are byproducts of burning coal.

Area Legislators

For 1010 Lumpkin

Congressional District 2: Ted Poe.
Texas State Senate District 7: Paul Bettencourt.
Texas State House District 138: Dwayne Bohac.

For discussion purposes - more to come.

Pew Research Center: Super Tuesday showcases electorate’s growing racial, ethnic diversity

This might be what sets off the authoritarian minded part of the electorate.

- Click here for the article.

The U.S. electorate this year will be the country’s most diverse ever, and that is evident in several Super Tuesday states holding primaries or caucuses on March 1 in which blacks could have a significant impact.

In five of 12 Super Tuesday states, blacks account for at least 15% of the electorate, according to a Pew Research Center analysis of 2014 census data. Black eligible voters have the largest footprint in Georgia (31%) and Alabama (26%), while Virginia, Tennessee and Arkansas also have sizable black electorates.

In a reversal of historical migration trends, Southern states have seen their black populations increase more than twice as fast as non-Southern states since 1990. From 1910 to 1970, 6 million blacks left the South, with many pursuing industrial jobs in Northern cities in what is called the Great Migration. But since then, blacks haveincreasingly chosen to live in the South.

. . . Hispanics have a large presence in the Super Tuesday states of Texas and Colorado. In Texas, Hispanics make up 28% of the electorate and outnumber blacks 4.8 million to 2.2 million. In Colorado, Hispanics make up a rising share of eligible voters, standing at nearly 15% in 2014, up from nearly 13% in 2008. Overall, Hispanics favor the Democratic Party, but to a lesser degree than blacks. Exit polls in 2014 in some states showed significant shares of Hispanic voters supporting Republican candidates in races for governor and U.S. Senate.

Several other Super Tuesday states have largely white electorates. For example, whites make up 95% of eligible voters in Vermont and 88% of eligible voters in Minnesota.

From ScotusBlog: Argument analysis: Two options on abortion law?

This is the case from Texas about whether restrictions on abortion clinics create an "undue burden"to women. The author walks through the argument.

The case is Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt.

- Click here for the article.

It was unmistakably clear on Wednesday that the Supreme Court’s first close look at abortion rights in nine years will turn on the reaction of Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, and there were at least sturdy hints that he would lead the Court in one of two directions. In an intense argument in Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt that ran twenty-six minutes longer than scheduled, Kennedy seemed poised to find a way out of a four-to-four split — if the initial vote comes to that — or to strike down by a narrow vote the two restrictions at issue in the 2013 Texas law, known as “HB2.”

Within minutes after the argument began shortly after ten o’clock, it seemed that the case might bog down in a dispute about whether the case contains any solid evidence of whether HB2 was, in fact, the cause for the sudden closing of half of all abortion clinics in the state and would cause even more to close if the Justices upheld the law’s two main clauses. The two are a requirement that all abortion doctors have a professional privilege to admit patients to a nearby hospital, and a requirement that all abortion clinics upgrade to facilities capable of performing surgery. There was even some question about whether the admitting privilege was still at issue.

But when the argument turned from the reason for closures to a question of the capacity of any remaining clinics to handle the tens of thousands of abortions that women in the state seek every year, the case shifted abruptly. It was Kennedy who raised the possibility that the case be sent back to lower courts to allow lawyers to put in evidence about that capacity question.

From the NYT: Ted Cruz Keeps Up Pressure on Donald Trump; Bernie Sanders Takes 2 on ‘Super Saturday’

Trump is a quarter of the way there - Clinton is almost halfway there.

- Click here for the article.

Senator Ted Cruz scored decisive wins in the Kansas and Maine caucuses on Saturday, demonstrating his enduring appeal among conservatives as he tried to reel in Donald J. Trump’s significant lead in the Republican presidential race.

Mr. Trump contained Mr. Cruz’s advances by winning in Louisiana and Kentucky. But the Texas senator’s wins were sure to energize the anti-Trump forces who are desperately trying to stop Mr. Trump’s march to the nomination, and they left little doubt that Mr. Cruz, who has now captured six states, is their best hope.

In Democratic contests, Hillary Clinton scored a commanding victory in Louisiana, the state with the most delegates in play on Saturday, while Senator Bernie Sanders won the Nebraska and Kansas caucuses, according to The Associated Press. The results did not alter the contours of a race in which Mrs. Clinton maintains a significant delegate lead.

The biggest stakes were on the Republican side, and the voters sensed it; turnout in Kansas, for example, was more than double that of 2012. Mr. Cruz won 48 percent of the vote there, while Mr. Trump received 23 percent, Senator Marco Rubio of Florida won 17 percent and Gov. John Kasich of Ohio won 11 percent. The results were tighter in Maine, but Mr. Cruz still easily defeated Mr. Trump there by 13 percentage points. With Mr. Trump’s victories coming by smaller margins, Mr. Cruz had the biggest delegate haul of the day, appearing to net at least 15 more than the front-runner.

From the Pew Research Center: A divide between college, non-college Republicans

An emerging and significant split within the party:

- Click here for the article.

And a couple graphs from it:

From Vox: The rise of American authoritarianism

Some researchers think this is the key to understanding Trump supporters. Until recently each party contained supporters with authoritarian tendencies. Now it seems they are drifting towards the Republican Party.

Authoritarianism is a term we cover in 2305 when we look at ideology.

- Click here for the article.

Hetherington and Weiler published a book about the effects of authoritarianism on American politics. Through a series of experiments and careful data analysis, they had come to a surprising conclusion: Much of the polarization dividing American politics was fueled not just by gerrymandering or money in politics or the other oft-cited variables, but by an unnoticed but surprisingly large electoral group — authoritarians.

Their book concluded that the GOP, by positioning itself as the party of traditional values and law and order, had unknowingly attracted what would turn out to be a vast and previously bipartisan population of Americans with authoritarian tendencies.

This trend had been accelerated in recent years by demographic and economic changes such as immigration, which "activated" authoritarian tendencies, leading many Americans to seek out a strongman leader who would preserve a status quo they feel is under threat and impose order on a world they perceive as increasingly alien.Trump embodies the classic authoritarian leadership style: simple, powerful, and punitive

These Americans with authoritarian views, they found, were sorting into the GOP, driving polarization. But they were also creating a divide within the party, at first latent, between traditional Republican voters and this group whose views were simultaneously less orthodox and, often, more extreme.

The Chief Justice’s Biggest Decision: John Roberts can either moderate his views or let himself drift into irrelevance.

Dual credit 2305's might find this worth a look. Not only does it discuss Robert's decision making process as chief justice - but it looks ta one of the cases I assigned this semester.

- Click here for the article.

. . . last term, Roberts played a . . . savvy game in Williams-Yulee v. The Florida Bar, a judicial campaign speech case. Williams-Yulee involved a Florida rule that forbade judicial candidates from personally soliciting campaign contributions. We don’t yet have an inside account of how the justices first split on Williams-Yulee, but it’s pretty clear—from the final opinions and from oral arguments—that Roberts had a dual agenda. First, he wanted to uphold the measure, an extraordinarily sensible and slight rule designed to prevent judicial panhandling and preserve judicial impartiality. (Roberts can be almost winsomely obsessive about maintaining America’s trust in judges.) Second, he wanted to retain the stringent “strict scrutiny” standard for laws that restrict judicial candidates’ speech, allowing Florida’s rule to survive while reminding states that any suppression of such speech must be narrowly tailored.

The other four conservatives were eager to strike down the Florida rule; the four liberals wanted to uphold it, but almost certainly preferred a lower standard of scrutiny. Ultimately, Roberts split the baby: He sided with the liberals to uphold the measure, but agreed with the conservatives that judicial speech laws must be subject to strict scrutiny. The compromise drew two grumbling opinions from Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer about the unsuitability of strict scrutiny in the judicial campaign context. But both justices signed onto the bulk of Roberts’ majority opinion, allowing the chief to strike a deft balance between the two blocs.

From Vox: The Green Lantern Theory of the Presidency, explained

One reason the public becomes disappointed with the performance of presidents is that we over estimate what they can accomplish. People tend to forget we live in a system of separated powers.

This is for 2305 mostly

- Click here for the article.

Presidents consistently overpromise and underdeliver. What they need to say to get elected far outpaces what they can actually do in office. President Obama is a perfect example. His 2008 campaign didn't just promise health-care reform, a stimulus bill, and financial regulation. It also promised a cap-and-trade bill to limit carbon emissions, comprehensive immigration reform, gun control, and much more. His presidency, he said, would be change American could believe in. But it's clear now that much of the change he promised isn't going to happen — in large part because he doesn't have the power to make it happen.

You would think voters in general and professional media pundits in particular would, by now, be wise to this pattern. But they're not. Each disappointment wounds anew. Each unchecked item on the to-do list is a surprise. Belief in the presidency seems to be entirely robust to the inability of any particular president to make good on their promises. And so the criticism is always the same: why can't the president be more like the Green Lantern?

What's wrong with the Green Lantern Theory of the Presidency?

Basically, it denies the very real (and very important) limits on the power of the American presidency, as well as reduces Congress to a coquettish collection of passive actors who are mostly just playing hard to get.

The Founding Fathers were rebelling against an out-of-control monarch. So they constructed a political system with a powerful legislature and a relatively weak executive. The result is that the US President has little formal power to make Congress do anything. He can't force Congress to vote on a bill. He can't force Congress to pass a bill. And even if he vetoes a bill Congress can simply overturn his veto. So in direct confrontations with Congress — and that describes much of American politics these days — the president has few options.

Green Lantern theorists don't deny any of this. They just believe that there's some vague combination of public speeches and private wheedling that the president can employ to bend Congress to his will.

. . .

From the Texas Tribune: Republican Presidential Race Fueled Record Primary Turnout

26.1% turnout in Harris County
27.8% turnout in Brazoria County.

- Click here for the article.

Voting turnout in Texas surged on Tuesday with a record high number of Republican voters making it to the polls for the party's primary, thanks to a volatile presidential party contest and the state's earlier position in the nation's primaries.

"It's unprecedented," said Tom Mechler, Texas GOP chairman. "It's definitely historical."

Melcher attributed the record-breaking turnout to Texas' place on the primary schedule plus the fact that this was only the second time in Texas history that there was a GOP primary in all 254 counties.

"The reason that this has happened is that Texans believe they are going to have a say," he said.

More than 2.8 million Republican ballots were cast in Texas, approximately double the 2012 Republican primary total of 1.4 million. In the Democratic primary, more than 1.4 million were cast, besting the 2012 totals but falling far short of the nearly 2.9 million Democratic ballots cast in the 2008 primary, when the contest between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton drew strong interest.

The combined turnout for both primaries this year is comparable to the 4.2 million primary ballots cast in 2008, according to unofficial totals.

From the Texas Tribune: Analysis: A Good Election Night to Be a Texas Incumbent

We never really throw the bums out.

- Click here for the article.

The status quo in Texas politics had a super Super Tuesday.

U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz — a hell-raiser, but a Texas hell-raiser — beat the hell-raiser from New York. Cruz ran as an outsider for Senate four years ago but now is positioning himself as the Republican establishment’s last hope to beat Donald Trump.

No congressional incumbent who wanted another term was defeated, in spite of some pre-election hype that probably helped raise some money and might have spurred some Texans to vote.

Three incumbents seeking re-election to the Texas Supreme Court held their ground against serious challengers. Two judges on the state’s highest criminal court emerged from their primaries unscathed.

No state senator who sought another term was defeated. Those races weren’t even close.
Only four incumbents in the 150-member Texas House lost their seats. Three more will live or die, politically speaking, in May runoffs.

All in all, it was almost boring. For incumbents, boring is good.

Imagine the alternative. In the latest University of Texas/Texas Tribune Poll, 67 percent of Texas voters said they have an unfavorable view of Congress, while an anemic 12 percent said the legislators in Washington are doing good work. They passed on the chance to do something about it, however, opting instead to send their current representatives back to D.C.

From the NYT: Donald Trump Finds Ally in Delegate Selection System, Much to G.O.P.’s Chagrin

The process was set up to quickly find an establishment candidate. It found Mr. Trump instead.

- Click here for the article.

Memo to Republican leaders: Be careful what you wish for.

Hoping to avoid a repeat of the messy fight for the Republican nomination in2012, the party drew up a calendar and delegate-selection rules intended to allow a front-runner to wrap things up quickly.

Now, with Republicans voting in 11 states on Tuesday, the worst fears of the party’s establishment are coming true: Donald J. Trump could all but seal his path to the nomination in a case of unintended consequences for the party leadership, which vehemently opposes him.

“Trump has significant advantages, and that’s the way the system is designed,” said Joshua T. Putnam, a political science lecturer at the University of Georgia with an expertise in delegate selection. “It’s right in line with what the folks designing these rules wanted. It’s just not the candidate they preferred.”

As the calendar flips, March brings a whirlwind of states voting on the same days and in quick succession. By the middle of the month, 58 percent of the total delegates will have been awarded, and Mr. Trump could be unstoppable in getting the 1,237 needed to clinch the nomination.

From the Texas Tribune: Travis County GOP Apoplectic Over New Chairman

This is pretty fun - and coarse.

- Click here for the article.

For a cleaner version of events:

- Travis County Republican Party Split Over Controversial Chairman-Elect.

In the weeks leading up to election day, incumbent Travis County GOP Chairman James Dickey kept a close eye on his opponent’s Twitter feed, watching the steady stream of sexually explicit tweets that targeted everyone from Rick Perry to Barbara Bush. Dickey chose not to sound the alarm — and the man behind the tweets, Robert Morrow, won the election decisively Tuesday.

Now, members of the Travis County GOP are split about their feelings toward their divisive incoming chairman — some pledge mass mutiny, but others embrace him as an agent of change.

Morrow is no stranger to controversy. He’s openly wished several politicians would have heart attacks, says he believes members of the Bush family should be in jail and operates three Twitter accounts, one of which is exclusively dedicated to the theory that President Lyndon B. Johnson was behind the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.

Some members of the county GOP, including vice-chair Matt Mackowiak, said these beliefs and antics should disqualify Morrow from the chairmanship — hours after the election, Mackowiak said he viewed Morrow’s election as a “hostile takeover.”

“Mr. Morrow’s behavior would get most children spanked, for good reason,” said Jim Suydam, the precinct 450 chairman. “Mr. Morrow's language in the media, his statements on social media, his oddly proud misogyny — none of this is acceptable in a polite society.”

Those statements “render Morrow unfit” to represent the GOP, Suydam added.
But several other Travis County precinct chairs told The Texas Tribune they disagree with that assessment and believe Morrow will represent the GOP well in his new role. Still others said that because Morrow had been democratically elected, they had no grounds to dispute his legitimacy.

“I have no problems with Robert Morrow,” said Gonzalo Camacho, precinct 149 chairman, in an email to the Tribune. “What people do on their own time is their business, guaranteed by the US Constitution.”

Party propositions on yesterday's ballots

I'm not sure how this did yet - I'll add that soon. In addition to determining who will be the candidates for the general elections, primary elections offer voters the opportunity to determine what their preferred party stands for that election cycle. A good look at the differences between the major parties.


Republican propositions

Proposition 1: Texas should replace the property tax system with an alternative other than an income tax and require voter approval to increase the overall tax burden.

Proposition 2: Texas cities and counties should be required to comply with federal immigration laws or be penalized by loss of state funds.

Proposition 3: Texas should prohibit governmental entities from collecting dues for labor unions through deductions from public employee paychecks.

Proposition 4: Texas and its citizens should strongly assert 10th Amendment Rights guaranteed by the US Constitution which states "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."

Democratic propositions

Referenda 1: Should the Texas Legislature and the United States Congress pass an economic security and prosperity plan for families that includes higher incomes by raising the state minimum wage to a livable wage, passing the Paycheck Fairness Act to ensure equal pay for equal work, guaranteeing paid family leave to care for a child or ill loved one, fully funding public neighborhood schools, and making a debt-free community college education a reality for hardworking students?

Referenda 2: Should the Texas Legislature and the United States Congress pass criminal justice reform legislation that ensures equal justice throughout our society without respect to race, socioeconomic status, geographic location, or other factors unrelated to behavior, ensuring as well common sense policies to protect the rights of law enforcement officers, the community, and defendants in the criminal justice system?

Referenda 3: Should the Texas Legislature and the United States Congress encourage the transition to renewable, non-polluting energy as a means to slow down climate change and its impact on the planet?

Referenda 4: Should the United States Congress pass the new Voting Rights Advancement Act to protect all American voters?

Referenda 5: Should the Texas Legislature allow each public institution of higher education (not only private universities) to opt out of the ability to carry guns on campus?

Referenda 6: Should the United States Congress pass a just and fair comprehensive immigration reform solution that includes an earned path to citizenship for law-abiding immigrants and their children, keeps families together, protects DREAMers, and provides workforce solutions for businesses?

Vox: Donald Trump's candidacy is going to realign the political parties

A few writers think this might happen.

- Click here for the article.

. . . here's my prediction: Over the next decade or so, the Republicans will split between their growing nationalist-populist wing and their business establishment wing, a split that the nationalist-populist wing will eventually win. The Democrats will face a similar split between the increasingly pro-corporate but socially liberally Clinton wing and a more economically progressive Sanders wing, a split that the Clinton wing will eventually win.

Eventually, the Democrats will become the party of urban cosmopolitan business liberalism, and the Republicans will become the party of suburban and rural nationalist populism (similar to what my colleague Michael Lind has predicted).

But this will take a while. And during the transition period, both parties will diversify to the point where they can again work within the uniquely compromise-dependent America system of separated institutions sharing power. As the parties weaken as coherent entities, the political system will become more fluid and dynamic, with more shifting coalitions and more opportunity for dealmaking, and less clear partisanship. For a while, American politics actually could be great again.

Here's more on the subject:

- The Trump Realignment: If Rubio's attacks on the Donald aren't successful, will neoconservatives leave the GOP for Hillary Clinton?

- The Great GOP Realignment: Ted Cruz and Donald Trump may herald an historic working-class Republican revolt against the party establishment.

Super Tuesday Results

From the Texas Tribune: 2016 Texas Primary Election Results.
538: What Happened on Super Tuesday.
NYT: 2016 Primary Results and Calendar.

From NPR: In Fighting FBI, Apple Says Free Speech Rights Mean No Forced Coding

This is new to me. The list of things that are alleged to fall under the heading of free speech seems limitless.


- Click here for the article.

The Justice Department wants Apple to write special software to help it break into the iPhone used by one the San Bernardino terrorists.

In its filing opposing a federal judge's order to help the government, Apple says it would be a violation of its First Amendment rights to free speech.

It's pretty well established that speech comes in many forms, says Eric Goldman, a professor at Santa Clara University School of Law. "We can talk, we can write words, we can draw paintings, we can take photographs ..."

Goldman says back in the 1990s, courts began to confront the question of whether software code is a form of speech. Goldman says the answer to that question came in a case called Bernstein v. US Department of Justice.

Daniel Bernstein was a student at the University of California, Berkeley, who created an encryption software called "Snuffle." Bernstein wanted to put it on the Internet, and the government tried to stop him using a law meant to stop the export of firearms and munitions.

Goldman says the student argued that his code was a form of speech.

"It clearly had expressive intent about what message the software author was trying to send to the world," Goldman says. "It was trying to say, 'I believe that privacy is important, and I'm going to use this software in order to express that.' "

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals agreed, and software has been treated as a form of speech ever since.
Based on that, Apple is arguing that the First Amendment also prevents the government from telling it what to say — in this case, that it's OK to break through the security on its phones.

From Vox: Primary voters don't really look like America

A point we've been making repeatedly in class.

- Click here for the article - and video!

We live in a country with a two-party system. We only get two real choices (usually) when it's time to pick a president. This means the people who decide each party's nominee play a hugely important role.

So who are these people?

For starters, it's a small group. Just 20 percent of American adults vote in presidential primaries. They tend to be older, whiter, and better-educated than your average general election voter.

Primary voters also tend to be highly partisan, which helps explain why ideas at the fringes of each party (free college for all, a giant wall along the Mexican-US border) gain traction during the primaries.

From the NYT: The Governing Cancer of Our Time

David Brooks seems to have his of anti-politics.

I've asked 2305 and 2306 students to use this as the basis of this week's written assignment - which also serves as the personal responsibility assessment. Roughly put - is it your responsibility to compromise?

- Click here for the article.

We live in a big, diverse society. There are essentially two ways to maintain order and get things done in such a society — politics or some form of dictatorship. Either through compromise or brute force. Our founding fathers chose politics.

Politics is an activity in which you recognize the simultaneous existence of different groups, interests and opinions. You try to find some way to balance or reconcile or compromise those interests, or at least a majority of them. You follow a set of rules, enshrined in a constitution or in custom, to help you reach these compromises in a way everybody considers legitimate.

The downside of politics is that people never really get everything they want. It’s messy, limited and no issue is ever really settled. Politics is a muddled activity in which people have to recognize restraints and settle for less than they want. Disappointment is normal.

But that’s sort of the beauty of politics, too. It involves an endless conversation in which we learn about other people and see things from their vantage point and try to balance their needs against our own. Plus, it’s better than the alternative: rule by some authoritarian tyrant who tries to govern by clobbering everyone in his way.

Need help figuring out Super Tuesday?

You are in luck.

- Ballotpedia: Super Tuesday presidential primaries, 2016.
- 538: Super Guide to Super Tuesday - Republican Edition.
- 538: Super Guide to Super Tuesday - Democratic Edition.

From ScotusBlog: Symposium: Abortion is still a fundamental right?

More on Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt.

How does the court make those decisions anyway, and how might the level of protection some rights have rise and fall?

- Click here for the article.

Dissenting in Planned Parenthood v. Casey, Chief Justice William Rehnquist claimed that the controlling joint opinion of Justices Sandra Day O’Connor, Anthony Kennedy, and David Souter rejected two key features of Roe v. Wade: abortion was no longer a “fundamental right,” and abortion restrictions were no longer subject to strict scrutiny, the late Chief Justice said. Following his lead, some scholars and lower court judges reason that the Casey joint opinion’s undue burden standard – which was subsequently employed by a majority of the Supreme Court – effectively demotes abortion from the status of fundamental right to something less.

Just how much less is illustrated by the opinion of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit now under review by the Supreme Court in Whole Woman’s Health v. Cole. In the view of the Fifth Circuit, when the Supreme Court upheld the federal Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act in Gonzales v. Carhart, it equated the undue-burden test with rational-basis scrutiny, the most permissive standard of review known to constitutional law.

That conclusion is wrong. The Casey dissenters thought that abortion regulations should be subject only to rational-basis scrutiny. A majority of the Court rejected that view. Although Casey and other post-Casey cases contain some confusing language, taken as a whole, these cases are best read as preserving the status of abortion as a fundamental right.

Seeing how Casey leaves heightened scrutiny intact for many abortion restrictions in turn sheds light on an otherwise mysterious aspect of that ruling’s articulation of the undue-burden test – the notion that a law can be an undue burden if it has “thepurpose or effect of placing a substantial obstacle in the path of a woman seeking an abortion” (emphasis added). The Court has not yet had occasion to apply the purpose prong of Casey, but this case presents the issue squarely.

The rise and fall of the language of fundamental rights

From the Atlantic: Will the U.S. Supreme Court Take Precedent Seriously on Abortion? Justices are set to hear a major case this week—and will be forced to decide whether they meant what they’ve said in the past.

Commentary on the court's upcoming look at Texas; abortion laws - Whole Woman's Health v. Hemmerstedt.

Here is the issue presented in the case:

Issue: (1) Whether, when applying the “undue burden” standard of Planned Parenthood v. Casey, a court errs by refusing to consider whether and to what extent laws that restrict abortion for the stated purpose of promoting health actually serve the government’s interest in promoting health; and (2) whether the Fifth Circuit erred in concluding that this standard permits Texas to enforce, in nearly all circumstances, laws that would cause a significant reduction in the availability of abortion services while failing to advance the State’s interest in promoting health - or any other valid interest.

- Click here for the article.

From the Atlantic: Clarence Thomas Breaks His Silence The Supreme Court justice asked a question for the first time in 10 years, revealing a different dynamic since the passing of Antonin Scalia earlier this month.

The case was Voisine v. United States - click here for Scotusblog's page on it.

Here is the issue before the court:

Issue: (1) Whether a misdemeanor crime with the mens rea of recklessness qualifies as a "misdemeanor crime of domestic violence" as defined by 18 U.S.C. §§ 921(a)(33)(A) and 922(g)(9); and (2) whether 18 U.S.C. §§ 921(a)(33)(A) and 922(g)(9) are unconstitutional under the Second, Fifth, and Sixth Amendments and the Ex Post Facto Clause of the United States Constitution.

- Click here for the article.

From the Texas Tribune: High Turnout Has Some Wondering if GOP Congressmen in Danger

The Tea Party looks to take out high profile Republicans - powerful ones.

- Click here for the article.

Expectations of a record turnout has some Texas Republicans on edge that a handful of U.S. House incumbents may be in tougher fights than usual.

Republican consultants are projecting the presidential primary will drive turnout for their party's primary to the highest levels in decades. And many of those Republican voters are expected to be first-time voters, drawn to the campaign by anti-establishment figures like real estate magnate Donald Trump and U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz.

The question looming over the next 24 hours is whether those voters only weigh in on the presidential race or continue on down the ballot and vote against sitting members of Congress.

Four Republican incumbents, in particular, are the subject of the strongest interest among Republican operatives: U.S. Reps. Kevin Brady of The Woodlands, John Culberson of Houston, Pete Sessions of Dallas and Lamar Smith of San Antonio.

A key point to consider: All four of these incumbents have powerful committee assignments in Washington. A loss in a runoff may serve as a boon for base conservatives, but would decrease the state’s legislative clout.

None of these Republicans are expected to lose outright on Tuesday. In fact, all four could end up breezing past their rivals and onto re-election.

But they could also be kicked to a dreaded runoff on May 24 if they fail to draw a majority of the vote. Whether or not a runoff, where turning out voters can be tougher, translates to mortal electoral danger for these incumbents has become a point of speculative debate among Texas political observers.

From the Texas Tribune: Texas Case Could Define Extent of Abortion Limits

For out look in 2306 at the relationship between the state of Texas and the national government - federalism they call it.

- Click here for the article.

Before Wendy Davis took to the floor of the Texas Senate for an 11-hour filibuster that ultimately failed to stop sweeping new restrictions on abortion, there was Casey.

Shorthand for Planned Parenthood v. Casey, the 1992 U.S. Supreme Court case reaffirmed a woman’s right to an abortion but gave states more power to restrict the procedure to “further the health or safety of a woman." The 5-4 ruling, however, also said states can't enact “unnecessary” regulations that have the “purpose or effect” of imposing an undue burden on those seeking the procedure.

On Wednesday, the court is expected to revisit the standards set by Casey — and potentially redefine the next era of abortion restrictions in the United States — when it takes up a legal challenge to Texas’ 2013 abortion restrictions, collectively known as House Bill 2. The Texas case, formally known as Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt, will allow the court to address disagreements among lower courts over what constitutes an undue burden and clarify how far states can go in restricting abortion.

It's the next step of a legal journey that began in Texas when lawmakers passed HB 2 almost three years ago. The law requires abortion clinics begin to meet the same standards as hospital-like ambulatory surgical centers, which range from minimum sizes for rooms and doorways to the number of nurses required to be on staff. A separate provision requires doctors who perform abortions to have admitting privileges at a hospital within 30 miles of an abortion clinic.

Only 19 Texas clinics remain of the more than 40 that were open before HB 2 passed, and the restrictions are blamed. If the Supreme Court upholds the abortion law in its entirety that number could fall to less than 10, all in major metropolitan areas.

“There will be a right in name as long as Roe is still on the books, but if there are no clinics, then what does that really mean in terms of the right to abortion if you can’t exercise the right?” asked Cary C. Franklin, a constitutional law professor at the University of Texas at Austin. “This case really puts that question front and center.”

From Vox: Don’t Assume Conservatives Will Rally Behind Trump

It's been a while since we have had a party realignment. Here's an argument that we have one coming up.

- Click here for the article.

If a Trump nomination happens, it will imply that the Republican Party has been weakened and is perhaps evenon the brink of failure, unable to coordinate on a plan to stop Trump despite the existential threat he poses to it. 

Major partisan realignments do happen in America — on average about once every 40 years. The last one, which involved the unwinding of the New Deal coalition between Northern and Southern Democrats, is variously dated as having occurred in 1968, 1972 and 1980. There are also a lot of false alarms, elections described as realignments that turn out not to be. This time, we really might be in the midst of one. It’s almost impossible to reconcile this year’s Republican nomination contest with anyone’s notion of “politics as usual.”

If a realignment is underway, then it poses a big empirical challenge. Presidential elections already suffer from the problem of small sample sizes — one reason a lot of people, certainly including us, shouldn’t have been so dismissive of Trump’s chances early on. Elections held in the midst of political realignments are even rarer, however. The rules of the old regime — the American political party system circa 1980 through 2012 — might not apply in the new one. And yet, it’s those elections that inform both the conventional wisdom and statistical models of American political behavior.

This doesn’t necessarily mean we’ll be completely in the dark. For one thing, the polls — although there’s reason to be concerned about their condition in the long-term — have been reasonably accurate so far in the primaries. And some of the old rules will still apply. It’s probably fair to guess that Pennsylvania and Ohio will vote similarly, for example.

Still, one should be careful about one’s assumptions. For instance, the assumption that the parties will rally behind their respective nominees may or may not be reliable. True, recent elections have had very little voting across party lines: 93 percent of Republicans who voted in 2012 supported Romney, for example, despite complaints from the base that he was insufficiently conservative. And in November 2008, some 89 percent of Democrats who voted supported Barack Obama after his long battle with Hillary Clinton.

Why vote? Maybe there's no need.

Some Texas Races Decided Before Voters Hit Polls.

We are just one week away from Super Tuesday but before a single ballot is counted in the March 1st Primary, we already know who some of the winners will be in November.

There are 16 seats up for grabs in the State Senate in the 2016 election. If you look at the list of Republican and Democratic candidates, 12 of these elections are one party races—meaning there are only Republicans or Democrats in the running.

Nine of the State Senate elections are one-person races—meaning there is only one candidate in the running.
According to their party’s websites, the Libertarian and Green Parties will challenge six of those seats in the general election but that still leaves three State Senators who are set to win the election by default.

It is still possible for other third party independent candidates to join the statewide races before the November election, but it’s difficult to win as an independent, especially when a candidate joins this late in the game.

The primaries narrow the list of candidates to determine who the Republican and Democratic nominees will be, but in many races, primary voters will only have one option within their party.

Between the State House and Senate Races, 47 percent of the Republican candidates will run unopposed in the primary election. The same goes for 45 percent of the Democratic candidates— they face no inner-party competition.

Some candidates will go completely unchallenged, with no bipartisan competition in the general election.

Of the 150 seats in the Texas House of Representatives, 48 candidates are set to run unopposed in both the primaries and that general election—that’s including competition from the Libertarian and Green parties.

In total, with the 48 seats in the State House and three senate seats, that’s more than 30 percent of state legislature who are set to get elected not by voters, but by default.

Political consultant David Butts said some argue this is not what a democracy should look like. “It’s more a ‘dollar-ocracy.’ It’s money basically controlling that system,” Butts said.

65 percent of all the elections in the state senate and house are one-party races and with only Republicans or only Democrats in the running, that means the winners will likely be determined in the primaries.

“Why spend money in a race when there is no chance of you winning?” Butts said, “Even if you spent $1 million in some of these seats, you couldn’t win.”

He said gerrymandering has become a “very refined art,” not just in Texas, but all across the U.S. “There is just no reason for running in them, they are either so Democratic or so Republican that no one can challenge them,” said Butts.

A political consultant with more than 30 years of experience in Texas politics, Butts said It’s not worth the opposing party’s time or money to enter a candidate in a race—especially when the dominate party has an incumbent in the running.

“You’re more likely to get struck my lightening then get one of those seats,” Butts said. “This is a numbers game, it’s math—you realize that the odds of you winning are very, very remote.”

The state’s voting districts were last drawn in 2011 by the Republican controlled legislature.

“Democrats do it, Republicans to do it and that leads to sort of a one party system that develops out of that,” Butts said, “The problem is that you have very few districts where you have a real contest.”

If election season is the time for voters to make their voices heard, Butts said a lack of competition gives them little say.

Republican incumbents face primary challengers from their right

It's what primaries are all about. Texas isn't conservative enough for some people apparently.


Rep. Dan Flynn Faces Challenger From the Right.

In a race pitting an East Texas incumbent against an upstart challenger endorsed by conservative activists, a pair of unlikely issues has dominated the Republican primary fight for House District 2: toll roads and a controversy at the University of Texas at Austin. Bryan Slaton, a businessman and former Baptist minister, is hoping to unseat six-term incumbent state Rep. Dan Flynn of Canton, saying Flynn has stayed in office too long and has become less conservative over time.

Three House Committee Chairman from Texas Face Primary Challengers from the Right.

Three of Texas’ seven U.S. House committee chairman are facing primary challenges from the right wing of the Republican Party. Other Texas Republican House members are also facing serious challengers. The newly selected House Ways and Means chair, Rep. Kevin Brady (R-TX), Rules Committee chair Rep. Pete Sessions (R-TX)  and Science Space and Technology chair Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX) all have primary opponents who are challenging their conservative credentials, The Hill reported.

Culberson faces challengers from the right. (behind a pay wall)