#Constitution at risk in November and other commentary

Just days after Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s death, the left is already hatching schemes to “pack the court, abolish the Senate filibuster and grant statehood to Washington, DC, and Puerto Rico,” all of which The Federalist’s John Daniel Davidson fears would “erode the constitutional mechanisms in place that Democrats see as impediments to their complete control over the levers of government power.” These ­attempts to “work around” the politically inconvenient parts of the Founding, such as equal state representation in the Senate, indicate that “the Constitution itself is on the ballot” this November. Democrats’ similar ­efforts to secure a “permanent majority” under President Barack Obama backfired when Trump took over. So we should “expect even more ­extreme measures” under the next Democratic administration. “They might start by packing the Supreme Court, but they won’t end there.”

From the right: Grow Up, Distraught Libs

“The cult around ‘Notorious RBG’ has displayed the emotional fragility of white liberals,” snarks Daniel McCarthy at Spectator USA. “Twitter and Facebook were flooded with emotional confessions” from liberals “ ‘literally shaking’ or crying over” the 87-year-old justice’s death. They “should grow up and accept the terms” of America’s Constitution. “Don’t cry, don’t riot,” just “accept that Donald Trump is president and Mitch McConnell is Senate majority leader, as a result of free and fair elections.” The left’s “dreams of packing” the Supreme Court won’t solve anything, either: “What Democrats pack, Republicans can pack or unpack, too.” So, Dems, “deal with its realistically and not like an emotional child. Ginsburg herself, through her friendship with Justice Scalia and her support for high culture, showed how progressives should conduct themselves.”

Legal take: Purge This Bias From Constitution

Like several candidates in past years, Kamala Harris has been wrongly accused of being ineligible for the presidency based on the Constitution’s requirement to be a “natural-born citizen,” sigh law profs Michael Klein and Ilya Somin at USA Today. “But the need to address the matter at all highlights why eligibility distinctions” based on birthplace or parental status should “be abolished. That eligibility for our highest political ­office is conditioned by an invidious discrimination buried in the Constitution itself should be highly disturbing” — it’s “little different from discrimination based on race, ethnicity or gender.” Yes, amending the Constitution would be “an uphill struggle.” But more people may soon see “how ridiculous this restriction is.” Or, at least, they may tire “of hearing this claptrap every four years.”

Faith beat: ‘Free the Mass’

San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone continues “to stand up to the inequitable treatment” of Catholics, reports Anne Hendershott at The American Spectator. With banners reading “We are ­Essential: Free the Mass!” thousands marched Sunday in a “Eucharistic procession to City Hall to protest the religious discrimination.” The city lets only one person into a church or ­cathedral at a time for private prayer, when retail stores open at 50 percent capacity and restaurants can serve indoors at 25 percent seating. Massive street protests are kosher, yet the city limits even outdoor Masses to 12 people, priests included. The Supreme Court has refused to slap down this discrimination, as “Chief Justice John Roberts sided with the liberal wing of the Court.” Now “religious freedom can be recovered as long as President Trump makes the wise decision in quickly appointing a new Justice to the Supreme Court.”

Ed desk: Calling Princeton’s Bluff

The federal Department of Education “called Princeton’s bluff on the question of systemic racism,” cheers City Journal’s Seth Barron, launching a probe after the Ivy’s president admitted his campus was guilty as charged by left-wing mobs. “For too long, false confessions of racial piety have been used as a cudgel to intimidate reasonable people and transform American institutions.” Now, there’s a price.

— Compiled by the Post Editorial Board