One of the Supreme Court Justices wants to re-examine past rulings by the court. Should the Supreme Court do this, be allowed to do this, or should all rulings be final?

You mean this? :
https://www.politico.com/news/2022/06/24/thomas-constitutional-rights-00042256

Clarence Thomas will be a threat to individual liberty and democracy every day he continues to serve.

The answer to your question is no.

Hell no.

Never.

I notice he didn’t say anything about miscegenation. Gosh.

The Supreme Court has over ruled precedent 232 times since 1810. It’s not rare. While I know there arer a lot of cases that should be revisited, I wouldn’t want the court to go looking for problems. If a case comes up, decide it on the facts. If the precedent doesn’t make sense, correct the error.

Rulings should not be final. The SCOTUS has made a number of terrible rulings throughout its history that were later nullified by later rulings. There’s no clear-cut rule for what “precedent” is and what rulings should be kept or re-examined. This is the system we have.

@Demosthenes – “No clear cut rule for what precedent is, and what rulings should be re-examined”?

Have you actually read Alioto’s ruling in Dobbs v Jackson? I’d suggest you do that. Because even if you don’t care about abortion rights (because hey, no womb no worries), I bet gay marriage hits a little closer to home. And that’s next on the hit list.

So get familiar with this way of thinking:

“In this case, five factors weigh strongly in favor of overruling Roe and Casey: the nature of their error, the quality of their reasoning, the ‘workability’ of the rules they imposed on the country, their disruptive effect on other areas of the law, and the absence of concrete reliance.” – Alioto, Majority opinion.

And here’s the preview of coming attractions :

“In future cases, we should reconsider all of this Court’s substantive due process precedents, including Griswold, Lawrence, and Obergefell.” – Thomas, Concurring opinion.

So the “rules” in this case are in plain sight, and they’re as twisted as the rotten politics we’ve all lived through for the last 15 years.

@JLoon Thomas conspicuously left out Loving v. Virginia..

And. Alito’s reasoning calls for review of Brown v. Board of Education and reinstatement of Plessy v Ferguson.

@JLoon Nowhere did I say I didn’t care about abortion rights. What I said is that what is “settled law” and “precedent” is nebulous, subjective, and there are no clear guidelines on it. The SCOTUS can choose to accept certain decisions as settled and untouchable and they can re-visit and overrule others. Yes, there is a pattern to these decisions that Thomas wants to “re-visit”, but they can essentially do as they please.

@Demosthenes – ”...Do as they please.” You mean just like Trump?

You sound more hopeless than a pregnant teen – and I’m trying to be sympathetic.

My reaction to Clarence Thomas, and mistrust of his legal judgement won’t change .But I think maybe there should be a little more attention on the last part of this question: “Should the Supreme Court be allowed to do this…or should all rulings be final?”

Fact is, the Court always deems it rulings to be final – until they aren’t. Because in real practice, decisions are only as good as their enforcement. And regardless of the order overturning Roe, the area of enforcement is far from certain.

Congress and the president each have authority to limit or pre empt Supreme Court decisions or jurisdictiction in instances where the court obstructs lawful public policy. That’s exactly what happened in the Civil Rights Act of 1991, and it can happen again:

“The Congress finds that
...the decision of the Supreme Court in Wards Cove Packing Co. v. Atonio, 490 U.S. 642 (1989) has weakened the scope and effectiveness of Federal civil rights protections; and legislation is necessary to provide additional protections against unlawful discrimination in employment.”

https://www.eeoc.gov/civil-rights-act-1991-original-text

No rulings should not be final anymore than the constitution is final.