00:00 We're going to go to Washington and Attorney Eric Leeson.
00:04 First of all, remind us, what is the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution?
00:11 Very important, very good question.
00:12 The 14th Amendment was passed in the wake of the Civil War, which as everybody more
00:20 or less knows, was fought between the states in the war succession.
00:25 It's literally called in the French translation of it, because half the country, more or less,
00:30 the southern states wanted to secede from the Union because they objected to notably
00:36 the institution of slavery being banned at the federal level.
00:41 After that, when the North won and the country was reunified, the South was considered traitorous.
00:48 They were insurrectionists.
00:49 I mean, these very people that were now seeking to come back into public office had been literally
00:56 killing Union soldiers and civilians during the war, and they had been proclaiming that
01:02 there should no longer be a United States, at least that they wanted to be part of, in
01:07 the way that was envisioned in the Constitution.
01:10 This was a huge issue, and the Congress led the efforts to pass a constitutional amendment,
01:17 the 14th Amendment, which has several sections, but the one we're talking about here, Section
01:21 3 notably says, "Look, if you have previously been an official in the United States government
01:29 and sworn an oath to uphold the Constitution and then violated that Constitution, you cannot
01:35 return to government."
01:37 In other words, Jefferson Davis, for example, who was the president of the Confederacy,
01:42 had he had it in his mind, of course, at the time that would have been considered crazy,
01:46 but say he had taken it in his head to become president of the United States and run against
01:51 Lincoln or Ulysses S. Grant or whoever, he would have been banned by this provision.
01:56 And in fact, several people running for Congress were banned by it.
02:00 So this is what we're talking about.
02:01 This is the provision of the Constitution that's at issue here.
02:04 And what we're seeing, the last time the U.S. Supreme Court delved into an election in such
02:10 a direct manner was in 2000 when it stopped a recount in Florida and George W. Bush, by
02:18 slender margin, won the presidency over Al Gore.
02:23 If the case does go to the Supreme Court, it looks like it might, Eric Lee, will this
02:29 be, again, this time it won't be about procedure.
02:32 This time it'll be actually about, as you just described it, an article of the Constitution.
02:37 Yes, it will be pure constitutional law directly applied.
02:43 Does this provision, it's only one sentence basically, in section three of the 14th Amendment,
02:49 mean what it says?
02:51 And we had back in 2000 a partisan vote, five to four.
02:58 This time there are six judges, justices appointed by Republicans versus three appointed by Democrats.
03:05 Will it be a partisan vote this time?
03:08 Well, you have to think that that's going to be a concern, just to be realistic.
03:13 Now, I would note that Judge Lutig, a former appellate federal judge, was on the airwaves
03:20 last night in the United States saying he didn't think it would be, and he's been a
03:25 big leader in sort of the civic awareness context of promoting the problems that Trump
03:33 faces because, according to Lutig and many others, Trump is disqualified from office
03:38 as an insurrectionist.
03:40 He said he has faith in the Supreme Court to rule strictly upon the law, and the law
03:47 is clear.
03:48 And I agree with that part of it, that the textual language is very clear.
03:54 But to be realistic, especially in light of all of the turbulence in all of the cases,
04:01 many of which you and I have discussed over the years by these same justices, you have
04:06 to think that there's no avoiding the partisan nature of this, and that's going to be the
04:12 big question that's looming over everything.
04:14 All right.
04:15 Another test for U.S. democracy coming up.
04:16 Eric Lison, many thanks for joining us from Washington.
04:19 Many thanks as well to Douglas Herbert.
