Niko Bowie
@nikobowie.bsky.social
Law professor at Harvard (https://hls.harvard.edu/faculty/nikolas-bowie/) Author with Daphna Renan of Supremacy: How Rule by the Court Replaced Government by the People (W.W. Norton, Sep. 15, 2026) (readsupremacy.com)
Whew—this hits me, personally, hard: "And although I know from speaking with multiple staffers that Trump’s attacks on the institution bolstered their commitment, time spent defending one’s work is time away from actually doing that work."
The Atlantic@theatlantic.com · 3d agoLonnie Bunch says he isn’t retiring because of Donald Trump, but the president shaped the Smithsonian secretary’s final years in the job, @clintsmithiii.bsky.social writes:
I red-teamed @nikobowie.bsky.social & Daphna Renan’s args vs judicial supremacy. “You hypocrites weren’t complaining when SCOTUS was with your side!” “Keeping vertical review still lets judges to constitutionalize their policy preferences!” “Your historical champions lost!” Here’s how they respond:
Roberts Court REELS as Congress is PRIMED to TAKE BACK COURT?!?!
YouTube video by Legal AF
youtu.be
The Supreme Court didn’t always hold the final say over the Constitution’s meaning. A new book argues that Americans need to reclaim ownership of our founding charter from nine robed lawyers. bit.ly/4xNVVml
Sorry, Justices — the Constitution Doesn’t Belong to You
A new book argues that Americans need to reclaim ownership of their founding charter from nine robed lawyers.
brennancenter.org
If you joined our What's the Plan on Supreme Court reform with @elienyc.bsky.social, this is a good follow up conversation with the authors of a new book with a bold idea that goes beyond court expansion and ethics. majorquestions.substack.com/p/sorry-just...
Sorry, Justices — the Constitution Doesn’t Belong to You
A new book argues that Americans need to reclaim ownership of their founding charter from nine robed lawyers.
majorquestions.substack.com
Really rare to spot something like this in the wild, but The Wall Street Journal ran a "Supreme Court Expansion Is Secretly Unconstitutional Actually" column that directly refutes its thesis in the paragraph that immediately follows. Beautiful stuff. www.wsj.com/opinion/is-c...
“Democrats would be better advised to follow the example of Thomas Jefferson’s Republicans,” this WSJ oped says about court reform. They thought the courts were so partisan they abolished entire circuit courts and prevented the Supreme Court from meeting for a year! www.wsj.com/opinion/is-c...
Opinion | Is Court Packing Constitutional? Don’t Be So Sure
The precedents don’t support what the Democrats want to do, which would be an assault on the separation of powers.
wsj.com
I really enjoyed this conversation with @jessewegman.bsky.social about our book and why regulating the Court is critical for restraining a lawless president
Sorry, Justices — the Constitution Doesn’t Belong to You
A new book argues that Americans need to reclaim ownership of their founding charter from nine robed lawyers.
majorquestions.substack.com
My tribute to Gloria Steinem. I am grateful to have known her and to keep the spirit of the magazine she co-founded thriving. Here's my latest @msmagazine.com. Gloria Steinem Lit a Revolution. The Torch Is Ours Now. msmagazine.com/2026/09/05/g...
Gloria Steinem Lit a Revolution. The Torch Is Ours Now.
Gloria Steinem’s legacy lives on as generations of women carry forward her revolutionary vision of feminism, bodily autonomy and hope.
msmagazine.com
This Labor Day I’m thinking about the presidential platform Eugene V. Debs ran on in 1912: - votes for women - proportional representation - overturn judicial supremacy - DC/territorial suffrage - make the Constitution easier to amend teachingamericanhistory.org/document/the...
"The 2028 presidential race is still months away from getting started, but one thing is already clear for the Democratic Party: reforming, or even expanding, the Supreme Court will be a litmus test for candidates running for the White House." 🎯 @paulblumenthal.bsky.social
Democrats Are Ready To Take On The Supreme Court In 2028
The rise of a conservative supermajority on the court helped launch the push. But it’s that supermajority’s actions that have since turbocharged it.
huffpost.com
Here’s my op-ed on Chief Justice John Roberts whitewashed history of President and Chief Justice William Howard Taft. Roberts adoration of Taft’s “restraint” conveniently omits Taft’s racism, refusal to condemn lynching, and embrace of Lost Causism. That’s no accident. share.inquirer.com/IcPlmx
Will the real William Howard Taft please stand up?
Chief Justice John Roberts penned an incomplete, but revealing, tribute to former President and Chief Justice William Howard Taft.
share.inquirer.com
Joining Bluesky as my book with @nikobowie.bsky.social hits bookstores this month! Join us for an event: readsupremacy.com.
Supremacy | Nikolas Bowie and Daphna Renan
How Rule by the Court Replaced Government by the People. Nikolas Bowie and Daphna Renan on how the Supreme Court seized the power it now wields.
readsupremacy.com
If you are employed as a teacher, researcher, graduate student, or in a related professional appointment at a college or university, you can support this work (and protect your own job) by joining the AAUP: www.aaup.org/join-aaup
Kathleen Bachynski@bachynski.bsky.social · last wk.“The rule is likely to face a legal challenge from the American Association of University Professors, one senior official said. The A.A.U.P., which advocates academic freedom, tenure protections and shared campus governance, led a successful lawsuit against the Trump administration last year”
I don’t talk as much about my work on military justice issues, especially my litigation efforts on behalf of servicemembers. But this is a really cool recognition of that work, and I’m grateful to the National Institute of Military Justice for the honor.
Georgetown Law@georgetownlaw.bsky.social · last wk.Congratulations to Professor @stevevladeck.bsky.social! He's now the inaugural holder of the National Institute of Military Justice's Professor Edmund Morgan Chair, honoring his contributions to military justice scholarship and litigation.
Daphna and I had a fun conversation with @mikesacks.bsky.social about how the Court built its power by stoking a fear of black voters and the labor movement
The Supreme Court's DARKEST SECRET Just Got EXPOSED...
YouTube video by Legal AF
youtu.be
I have a piece in the Atlantic about SCOTUS’s ballroom order - and how the Court has a very wrongheaded and destructive account of the separation of powers www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/0...
still one of my favorite things we’ve ever put on the blog!!
LPE Blog@lpeblog.bsky.social · 2w agoAre you a law student experiencing the dizzying process of moral decontextualization, as questions of power and justice seem oddly absent from the curriculum? If so, the Law and Political Economy movement might be for you. Check out this classic post on what LPE has to offer to new law students.
Terrific review of a very important book. Check them both out!
Niko Bowie@nikobowie.bsky.social · 2w agoEvery author hopes for a reviewer who reads generously, takes the argument seriously, and pushes back where it matters. Grateful to Daniel Immerwahr for this review of Supremacy in the New Yorker.
Every author hopes for a reviewer who reads generously, takes the argument seriously, and pushes back where it matters. Grateful to Daniel Immerwahr for this review of Supremacy in the New Yorker.
Has the Supreme Court Sandbagged Democracy?
A new legal history argues that the Justices should be stripped of their power to overrule coequal branches of government. It arrives at an awkward moment.
newyorker.com
If Dems win a trifecta in 2028 and don't push forum-shopping reform (and related judicial reforms) as their first bill, they'll doom everything else they try to do. www.nytimes.com/2026/08/30/u...
How Trump’s Policy Agenda Runs Through One Federal Court, in Texas (Gift Article)
For years, conservative litigants flocked to Judge Reed O’Connor’s district. Now, North Texas has become a favorite destination of the Justice Department.
nytimes.com
In Temporarily Blocking the USPS Mail Ballot Rule, Federal Court Recognized the Timing Games that the US DOJ Tried to Play to Sneak the USPS Vote Suppression Rule Through the Courts; Will the Supreme Court Agree? electionlawblog.org/2026/in-temp...
In Temporarily Blocking the USPS Mail Ballot Rule, Federal Court Recognized the Timing Games that the US DOJ Tried to Play to Sneak the USPS Vote Suppression Rule Through the Courts; Will the Supreme ...
Justin noted that the district court this evening in the 23-state case (Trump v. California) and the voting organizations case (LWV v. Trump) issued a temporary restraining order barring USPS from imp...
electionlawblog.org
Several of these places are going to be surprised to be called “US Territories” by the president
Matt Novak@paleofuture.bsky.social · 2w agoHe’s so pathetic
The first week of the Supremacy book tour is online! Join us in Boston, New York, or DC to talk about the tradition of abolitionists and organizers who saw the Supreme Court's power as a threat to democracy—and who offered us the tools we need to do something about it. www.readsupremacy.com/events
It’s even more egregious: In Clapper, SCOTUS said injury was too speculative for standing at the summary judgment stage, after the benefit of discovery. That standard of review is higher than this situation. Clapper’s standard is inapplicable at the PI stage where there hasn’t been discovery.
Niko Bowie@nikobowie.bsky.social · 3w agoRight before the Snowden leak the Court called it “speculative” that the NSA was spying on our emails. Now it's invoking the same case to say it’s only speculative when Trump issues an order—with no basis in law or the Constitution—that tries to regulate mail-in ballots and prosecute state officials
Right before the Snowden leak the Court called it “speculative” that the NSA was spying on our emails. Now it's invoking the same case to say it’s only speculative when Trump issues an order—with no basis in law or the Constitution—that tries to regulate mail-in ballots and prosecute state officials
