[This post is co-authored with Professor Seth Barrett Tillman]
On Thursday, February 15, 2024, Professor Mark Graber published a post on Balkinization titled "The Enforcement Act of 1870: Disqualification Myths and Realities." Graber accuses Trump's lawyers of "fabrication" and "mythmaking" concerning Griffin's Case and the Enforcement Act of 1870. He writes that Trump's lawyers "claim[ed] that Griffin's Case inspired the Enforcement Act of 1870."
- "Donald Trump's lawyers engaged in mythmaking when in their briefs and in oral argument they insisted that Congress was responding to Chief Justice Salmon Chase's claim in Griffin's Case (1869) that constitutional disqualification was not self-executing, that no person could be disqualified from office in the absence of federal legislation." (emphasis added).
- "The Trumpian claim that Griffin's Case inspired the Enforcement Act of 1870 is a fabrication." (emphasis added).
- "The only evidence Trump and his lawyers have that Griffin's Case influenced the Enforcement Act of 1870 is that Griffin's Case was decided in 1869, the year before the Enforcement Act was passed." (emphasis added).
