Summary
Trust in the U.S. judicial system has hit a record low, with only 35% of Americans expressing confidence, according to Gallup.
Criticism centers on the Supreme Court’s conservative majority, accused of advancing right-wing agendas, eroding rights like abortion access, and lacking accountability.
This judicial capture, orchestrated by conservative groups like the Federalist Society, ensures Republican dominance in key policies for decades, regardless of future elections.
Why would I trust a branch of government who, amoung other things, said; president’s rule like kings; money is speech; rulings from the 1600s supercede any modern day interpretation of law.
I wouldn’t invite a person like this into my house non the less let them rule a branch of government.
Catastrophic? I see nothing to indicate they care if they’re trusted or that there are ramifications for not being so.
Well, the ramifications is more vigilantism. Trust in the justice system is a requirement for people to assume justice will be done through that system. When people no longer trust it then they seek alternative methods.
Maybe catastrophic for democratic norms. But it’s perrrrrrfect for fascists and their schemes.
Well, it’s kinda like they’ve given us every reason not to…
That sounds bad indeed.
Comparison: over here in Estonia, out of the general population, 71% trust the courts (an increase from 55% as measured back in 2013). Out of lawyers, 88% trust the courts here. A bit north of here, in Finland, 83% of the population “think that the courts are independent or very independent” (I failed to find a direct question about trust).
Thanks for the perspective!
I mean y’all also generally dont need to worry so much since if the courts do fuck up, you dont have to worry about being tortured, raped, and murdered in your prisons.
Trust in law enforcement has been plummeting for a long time too. Prosecutors are going to have a much harder time convincing a jury of much of anything.
Hence the popularity (on the corporate side, at least) of binding arbitration.
Supreme Court.
Trump.
35% is far too high.
I still meet people who trust a police officer to have their best interests in mind.
Are they white & wealthy?
i trust them to not have our best interest at heart
Now split this data out by income and you’ll get a much different set of data.
For the life of me I’m baffled that’s it’s as high as 35%
Did you see the popular vote?
Yeah I mean that was about 30% of the population, so it tracks
Middle class and dumb peasants.
The US justice system has gone out of its way to make itself not trustworthy. It’s surprising it’s that high.
Well 3 of 9 judges supported putting in codified ethics I believe. So that means I’d think 33% of them were trustworthy. Throw in 2% for the people who answered, yes I trust them… because they trust them to act in their own best interests, and we got to 35% haha
This guy cried about liking beer and he’s in charge of the law of the land.
I don’t know about that one, sounds like a fun story haha
Edit: what was it that happened?
The trump administration in 2016-2020 sped through his nomination.
It was one of the many shitshow experiences that Trump did in his first presidency and honestly, it’s shit like this that people forget of how fucking awful a Trump Presidency is.
https://www.vox.com/2018/10/3/17928698/brett-kavanaugh-blackout-drinking-alcohol
I didn’t. There are many things I’m dreading.
Like, how could you not be excited for the return of the administration that coined the term “alternative facts”
Ah, I didn’t recognize him. Never paid attention to the drinking or blacking out stuff. Thanks for the response though, guessing people thought my asking was insincere. Not really ready for 2025 yet, that’s for sure
But this poll is not about the percentage of the justice system that might be trustworthy. It’s about how many people thing the system is trustworthy, and if only 1/3 of the system is trying to make it trustworthy, then it demonstrably isn’t.
Agreed. I suppose I needed to indicate that I was being facetious somehow.
It was obvious to me.
The guardian are corporate shills. This is a GOOD thing. If Luigi wins, that’s precedence. Time to pop some brass.*
* brass, meaning c-suite
Luigi Mangione has a higher favorability than the US justice system.
That’s where we’re fucking at.
Number of executives held accountable in 2024: 1
Do better in '25
What’s his favorability number? I would guess 50% at least.
It’s closer to 25% across the board. Younger folks (under 30) have closer to 40%, but the olds are not super stoked on him.
As I had to explain to my boomers “you worked for the state government long term, and 15 years at a single company, respectively, prior to retirement. You both got into good positions wrt: healthcare coverage. People these days are unable to secure promotion without job hopping, and are subject to rolling layoffs, putting them fully at the mercy of whatever low budget health insurance their new companies decide to use, but additionally, companies are swapping to cheaper plans for new/existing employees to save overall money, meaning what you were offered and what your newer peers were offered was probably not the same before you retired.”
They do not at all get it and they are not into my hype for it. Not a bit.
To say nothing of all our other problems, anyone should be able to grasp the idea that the US health insurance industry is inherently evil. They provide and create nothing. It’s a whole sector of the economy that exists solely to extract profit by amplifying human suffering and death. It should and must be abolished.
When you have judges accepting cash for kids 35% seems outrageously high.
And Biden pardoning said “kids for cash” folks when they are actually held to account.
Pardons this dude, but refuses to pardon people like Snowden who broke laws for the public good.
Did he refuse? Link to claim?
yo what the fuck, that is bullshit
From what I read Biden didn’t seek that judge to pardon, he was just one person affected by some big mass pardons. In this case I think he was one of like 1500 people who were moved to house arrest for non-violent crimes during Covid, who Biden pardoned all at once.
Still not great, the administration should’ve reviewed the details of those cases first, but it’s not like he deliberately sought the guy out.
The mass wave of pardons has really highlighted to me how broken the justice system is, but for complicated reasons. I can’t remember which case it was, but I read of one of the controversial pardons and felt outraged. Then someone, much like yourself, pointed out that this was due to the COVID house arrest stuff, and I conceded that it probably made sense. But then I felt conflicted, because if I didn’t want them to be back in prison, why did I still feel so angry?
The unfortunate answer is that prison doesn’t give us justice. I have been a victim of crimes that I haven’t reported because I have seen how traumatising that process is for victims. When the trial is over and the perpetrator is behind bars, the person most affected by the crime must then struggle to heal from both the trauma of the original incident, and the additional, separate trauma of interacting with the justice system. Seeing someone punished might soothe the sting a little, but it doesn’t help one to heal.
Reading about restorative justice approaches makes me feel hopeful, though it’s a radical enough approach that we haven’t had many chances to see it in action. Even if the cultural consciousness moved away from its retributive understanding of justice, widespread implementation of restorative approaches wouldn’t be a straightforward task. However, I feel that for a huge amount of cases, it would be better than we have now.
He tortured children for money. The trial was done. They should have sent him back to prison and never let him out.
Can’t help but agree with both of you ‘(I am large, I contain multitudes.)’
Didn’t some of those children commit suicide?
How can we know this for sure though. Not trying to throw rocks at you, but to me that really sounds like speculation. at the end of the day he is accountable for his actions and I have seen way too many “woopsies” in the arc of his career. Past a certain point “I made a mistake” loses all credibility.
I mean, epistemologically we can’t know anything for sure. All we can do is try to come to reasonable conclusions with the information available to us.
The job of President is complicated. It is not remotely possible to go over every single detail of every single action. Every president makes whoopsies, I prefer to give benefit of the doubt between mistakes and malice. There are plenty of intentional things to criticize without sensationalizing this sort of thing
