In the coming days, the Supreme Court will announce its decisions on two cases that ask the same basic question: how far should partisan politics go?

One will determine whether a citizenship question will appear on the 2020 census. The other asks whether partisan gerrymandering is constitutional.

With these decisions imminent, that same question about partisanship in non-partisan institutions hangs over the court itself. Still wounded by Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation battle, the nation’s highest court has a “virus of illegitimacy.” And with Democratic candidates endorsing proposals to pack the court, that virus could remake the third branch of American government.

On this week’s Radio Atlantic, Isaac Dovere discusses the court with lawyer and Slate writer Mark Joseph Stern.

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