A lot of people agree that the current court is hyperpartisan but see alternatives to addressing that: barring the court from taking on certain kinds of cases or restricting its power to make sweeping rulings; limiting its ability to make law via the so-called shadow docket; creating term limits for the justices. But such reforms require legislation enacted by Democrats — which the current court will be eager to strike down as unconstitutional. And if the conservative justices don’t outright invalidate such reforms, Republicans and their court allies can be counted on to find ways to render them toothless. If you think of at least five of the current justices as more Republican partisans than legal experts with conservative views (all the GOP appointees except for Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr.), then you will be skeptical of any piecemeal Democratic effort to reform the court.

The Democrats need to act decisively — by adding four justices and giving themselves a majority. There is plenty of precedent for adding justices to the court. A 7-6 Democratic court would push American law in a pro-democracy direction that, because the GOP is moving in an anti-democratic direction, will unfortunately also seem pro-Democratic Party. Such a court would make it harder to enact restrictions on voting or gerrymander in a way that denies people the ability to cast meaningful votes. It would no doubt also rule in pro-Democratic ways that aren’t really about core democratic values — by, for example, upholding progressive economic policies such as the eviction ban the current court invalidated.

It’s true that when the Republicans next gain control of the Senate and the presidency, they would likely add more justices to wrest back control of the court. Yes. Exactly. I would personally disagree with the rulings produced by such a court. But it wouldn’t mean that the court was becoming more partisan. Rather, adding justices would serve as an open acknowledgment that the court already is partisan. And it would allow both parties to benefit from that partisanship, instead of just one — the GOP — as things stand right now.