After Tennessee’s Republican-controlled legislature expelled two Black House Democrats for taking part in a gun violence protest last week, the state has drawn further protests at the capitol and national scrutiny. The incident raised concerns about the extreme measures that supermajority state legislatures can take to punish those with differing views in today’s bitter political climate. “We have seen in other contexts in which a state governor or legislature crosses a boundary that had not been breached before that other states sometimes follow suit,” says Rick Pildes, a professor at New York University Law school. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] On March 27, a shooting at a Nashville school left six dead, including three children.