https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/12/20/colorado-trump-ballott-supreme-court/https://law.resource.org/pub/us/case/reporter/F.Cas/0011.f.cas/0011.f.cas.0007.htmlSo some ancient precedent
does exist in 14th amendment rulings, which someone dragged out of a history book.
In Re Griffin, 1869, posed the question of Caesar Griffin being sentenced to 2 years in prison for assault with intent to kill by a judge who was a former confederate officer. He petitioned the court arguing that the 14th amendment barred the judge in his trial from holding office, therefore his conviction must be overturned. Chief Justice Chase penned the ruling that Section 3 of the 14th amendment was not self-executing and could not be enforced by a court, but only by an act of congress;
Quote
Is there, then, any other reasonable construction? In the judgment of the court there is another, not only reasonable, but very clearly warranted by the terms of the amendment, and recognized by the legislation of congress. The object of the amendment is to exclude from certain offices a certain class of persons. Now, it is obviously impossible to do this by a simple declaration, whether in the constitution or in an act of congress, that all persons included within a particular description shall not hold office. For, in the very nature of things, it must be ascertained what particular individuals are embraced by the definition, before any sentence of exclusion can be made to operate. To accomplish this ascertainment and ensure effective results, proceedings, evidence, decisions, and enforcements of decisions, more or less formal, are indispensable; and these can only be provided for by congress.
Now, the necessity of this is recognized by the amendment itself, in its fifth and final section, which declares that “congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provision of this article.”
There are, indeed, other sections than the third, to the enforcement of which legislation is necessary; but there is no one which more clearly requires legislation in order to give effect to it. The fifth section qualifies the third to the same extent as it would if the whole amendment consisted of these two sections. And the final clause of the third section itself is significant. It gives to congress absolute control of the whole operation of the amendment These are its words: “But congress may, by a vote of two-thirds of each house, remove such disability.” Taking the third section then, in its completeness with this final clause, it seems to put beyond reasonable question the conclusion that the intention of the people of the United States, in adopting the fourteenth amendment, was to create a disability, to be removed in proper cases by a two-thirds vote, and to be made operative in other cases by the legislation of congress in its ordinary course. This construction gives certain effect to the undoubted intent of the amendment to insure the exclusion from office of the designated class of persons, if not relieved from their disabilities, and avoids the manifold evils which must attend the construction insisted upon by the counsel for the petitioner.
It results from the examination that persons in office by lawful appointment or election before the promulgation of the fourteenth amendment, are not removed there from by the direct and immediate effect of the prohibition to hold office contained in the third section; but that legislation by congress is necessary to give effect to the prohibition, by providing for such removal. And it results further that the exercise of their several functions by these officers, until removed in pursuance of such legislation, is not unlawful.
Pretty direct repudiation of the Colorado decision, 154 years removed. At the time, the concern was trying to avoid the politically sticky question of whether secession equaled treason, which the court very much did not want to answer and never did.
And since congress has no law to remove a president from the ballot, this precedent invalidates the colorado ruling, and is from a higher court