Are The Excommunications Even Legal?

According to the 1983 Code of Canon Law, the SSPX's 1988 episcopal consecrations incurred automatic excommunication (latae sententia) under Canon 1387, but Canon 1324 provides that penalties must be diminished or substituted when the offender acted under circumstances of necessity, grave inconvenience, or lawful self-defense. The SSPX has consistently argued that the crisis in the Church constitutes a state of necessity that justifies their actions, making the automatic excommunication potentially subject to mitigation under canon law's subjective exceptions.