The National Interest: Jonathan Chait - The Last Republican Politician

Can John Roberts stave off a Democratic assault on the Supreme Court?

THE REPUBLICAN PARTY HAS BEEN in desperate need of a pragmatic leader who can gauge public opinion, shrewdly husband political capital, and advance the party's agenda in sustainable ways. That leader has materialized in the form of John Roberts.

The chief justice of the Supreme Court is attempting to navigate the disjuncture between voters, who on the whole are sharply divided but have slightly favored Democrats, and the power Republicans have accumulated through the Supreme Court, which is quasi-permanent and unbounded by any other political branch.

In theory, Republicans could use their hammerlock on the high court to settle a long series of social and economic disputes in their party's favor. This is the course many conservatives hoped, and liberals feared, the conservative Court would take, especially after Donald Trump was able to seat three justices and pad its right-wing majority. Instead, Roberts has pursued a more cautious strategy, and the question is if this will be enough to shore up the Court's falling popularity and disarm Democratic threats to overhaul it.