What Will Happen Now If Eight Supreme Court Justices End Up Deadlocked 4-4 on a Case? Here’s the Answer.

[WestVirginiaRebel]

The Blaze:

Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia’s death over the weekend instantaneously raised a plethora of questions about his eventual replacement, igniting a political firestorm during an already heated and chaotic election year.

 

Democrats have been urging President Barack Obama to waste no time in nominating a successor, to which Obama has responded that he plans to do just that. On the flip side, Republicans are imploring the president to give that right to the next commander in chief.

 

Partisan bickering and maneuvering aside, one of the finer details surrounding the conundrum is what, exactly, happens on the Supreme Court when there are just eight justices and a ruling ends in a 4-4 stalemate?

 

When there are nine justices, it’s relatively simple to determine which side trumps, as a 5-4 conclusion to a case makes the majority view clear.

 

But with eight active justices, the situation changes quite a bit, though Adam Winkler, a law professor at the University of California Los Angeles, told the Guardian that there’s nothing all that rare about only having eight justices on the bench.

 

Winkler noted that, even when there’s a full court comprised of nine active justices, there are certain cases in which one of them decides to recuse him or herself, leaving just eight to decide on a particular case.

 

“Over American history the size of the court has varied from six members to 10 members to seven members to nine members,” he said. “There’s nothing magic about nine.”

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Nightmare scenario?