Pardon this interruption to the viewing of tonight’s speeches from President Obama and Senator Harris, but the United States Supreme Court has, in its unintentional way, given us a reminder about what this election is about.

Today, the United States Supreme Court announced its November argument session.  That session begins on November 2, the day before the election, and continues until November 10.   (While the argument session usually has six argument days, the last day would fall on Veteran’s Day; so there will only be five argument days.)

While the United States Supreme Court normally tries to avoid doing anything overtly political on election day, this year’s docket brings political issues to the center more than some on the Court would probably like.  While one of the two cases being heard on election day is a typical federal criminal law statutory dispute of the type that puts non-lawyers to sleep, the other case (Jones vs. Mississippi) is a continuation of the Supreme Court’s examination of what sentences are appropriate for juveniles tried as an adult.

And, if that were not enough of a highlight for November, the significance goes up for the post-election day cases.  The day after the election, the Supreme Court will hear whether the First Amendment (Free Exercise Clause) bars a local government from requiring that all adoption-placement agencies comply with the local government’s policy of non-discrimination in placement.  In that case, Fulton vs. City of Philadelphia, Philadelphia requires placement agencies to not discriminate against gay and lesbian foster parents.  Certain religious-affiliated placement agencies think that they should not have to consider gay and lesbian foster parents because they believe that such persons are not appropriate placements for religious reasons.

And November wraps up with the big case of next term (at least of the cases already accepted) — the battle between red and blue states over whether Congress — by changing the penalty for violating the individual mandate to $0 — implicitly repealed the Affordable Care Act.

(I am a little shocked that any of these cases made it to the November argument session.  I would not have been surprised if the Supreme Court had postponed them until December.  Even though only Jones is on election day, the close proximity of the other two cases could well lead to their being discussed in the news in the run-up to the election.  The current October argument docket is mostly the relatively low interest cases that would have been argued in March and April if Covid had not thrown everything off.)

These three cases — whether taken individually or together — are a good summary of what this election is about.  Will Congress and the judiciary support providing adequate health care to all and protect the rights of ordinary people or do the only rights that matter are those of main stream groups that want the right to discriminate against minority groups.   It is clear that the interest groups that run the Republican Party wants a judicial system composed of people who take a very selective view of history to interpret the law in ways that protect the powerful from losing their advantaged position whenever the disadvantaged gain even the slightest bit of power.

One can always debate the precise place to draw the lines in any case, but the big picture view of the purpose of the justice system pushed by the far right is simply wrong, and it threatens the rights of the rest of us.  One of the things that this election will decide is who gets to appoint the judges and justices who will decide who gets a fair shake in the legal system and who does not.    But the ultra-conservative reactionaries long ago decided that controlling the courts matters to them (and in some cases is the only voting issue).   The question is whether moderates and progressives realize that we can’t afford to give Trump another four years to rubber stamp the unqualified candidates that Moscow Mitch and the Federalist Society want to foist upon us.

Now back to the more enjoyable events of the Democratic Convention.