As liberal fury over Justice Anthony Kennedy’s retirement continues to escalate, there’s a clear mindset behind the Left’s opposition tactics: “If we stop winning, we want to immediately change the rules.” In the week after Kennedy’s retirement was announced, some Democrats have revived their calls to “court pack”— increase the number of seats on the Supreme Court and fill those seats with justices sympathetic to their social agenda. This is something they also called for during the confirmation hearings for Justice Neil Gorsuch.

One headline in The Week put it boldly and bluntly: “How Democrats can make Republicans pay for Justice Gorsuch.” We’ve seen this tactic before at times when liberals have lost. Immediately after the 2016 presidential election, liberals called for a popular vote victory rather than one based on the Electoral College.