A new Justice, Democracy, and Law essay for SCOTUSblog (written before yesterday’s Eighth Circuit ruling, and none of the essay’s points is affected by that ruling), which begins:

‘People complain that the current Supreme Court is a partisan institution, with the six Republican appointees deciding cases based on their partisan beliefs.

‘But two recent and significant cases on the court’s emergency docket refute that complaint, or at least the most simplistic version of it.

‘The two cases are, first, the fight over Missouri’s congressional map and, second, the suit to stop implementation of the U.S. Postal Service’s rule, adopted at President Donald Trump’s direction, to block the delivery to voters of vote-by-mail ballots unless they appeared on a list provided by their home state’s election officials.

‘In both cases, the court foiled what Republicans – and specifically the Trump administration – wanted. In both cases, the court’s fidelity to nonpartisan enforcement of the law prevailed over the position that the Republican litigants urged the court to take.”