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Importance of the supreme court
Role of the united states supreme court essay
Importance of the supreme court
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“If the Supreme Court rules a certain way, then it must be law.” Many Americans have this concept of the federal court system; they believe that the Supreme Court has immense power over all the court systems, yet that is far from the truth. In today’s society, the Supreme Court has the highest approval rating compared to all of the other branches of government. Now the question is what actions does the Supreme Court take that affect my life directly, for me to believe it that it has such great power? If the authority of the Supreme Court is studied under a magnify glass, then you will see that it is an abstract concept which derives from the support of the American population. This is the point, us Federalist, are trying to get people to understand. …show more content…
Yates states in Brutus 11, “Every extension of the power of the general legislature, as well as of the judicial powers, will increase the powers of the courts… This power in the judicial, will enable them to mould the government, into almost any shape they please.” The fear is that the Court will begin to stick its hand in legal problems of the state that do not concern them; however, even in present times, there is a strict procedure to how cases get to be heard before the Supreme Court. If a person wants to have their case debated at the level of the Supreme Court, they must first go through all of the state appellate processes and go through their state supreme court or court of last resort. Hamilton explains the importance of procedures with regards to the court system and the importance of the balance between state and federal court system, in Federalist 82, “for not to allow the State courts a right of jurisdiction in such cases, can hardly be considered as the abridgment of a pre-existing authority… that the State courts would have a concurrent jurisdiction in all cases arising under the laws of the Union.” As Federalists, we understand that there must be rules to govern the court system. The fear that the Anti-Federalists have is without bases. The Supreme Court only takes cases that present a constitutional question or a conflict among federal governments, just like it is stated in the
The case came to the Supreme Court as the infamous Federal versus State battle for power. Once again the question plagued Marshall whether to support Federalism, or keep States’ rights alive.
Federalist #78, written by Alexander Hamilton, is an essay to argue for the proposed federal courts, their powers, and means of appointing judges. In the essay, Hamilton claims that the judiciary will be the “least dangerous to the political rights of the Constitution.” He says it will be the least , dangerous because the branch will be the least in abundant use. This implies that the other two branches will be used more. The executive branch not only “dispenses the honors”, but also enforce the laws over the entire country. The legislative branch holds the budget for the country and creates the laws in which the citizens must abide by. The judiciary, he says, will have no power over the executive and legislative branches. He also writes that it cannot move forward the society in wealth and in strength, and cannot resolve any active problems that the country is facing in any circumstances. According to Hamilton, the judiciary could be said to have “neither force nor will, but merely judgment,” and that it must depend on the executive branch, even to make their judgments more effectiv...
In Federalist 78, Alexander Hamilton argued that the Judicial Branch is the “least dangerous to the political rights of the Constitution" and that it is “beyond comparison the weakest of the three departments of power” since it has “neither force nor will, but merely judgment.” [*] While it is true that Hamilton wrote the Federalist Papers as propaganda to garner support for the Constitution by convincing New Yorkers that it would not take away their rights and liberties, it is also true that Article III of the Constitution was deliberately vague about the powers of the Judicial Branch to allow future generations to decide what exactly those powers should be. In the 1803 case of Marbury v. Madison, the Supreme Court, led by Chief Justice John Marshall, established the Court’s power of judicial review. However, as Jill Lepore, Harvard professor of American History, argued, “This was such an astonishing thing to do that the Court didn’t declare another federal law unconstitutional for fifty-four years” after declaring the Judicial Act of 1789 unconstitutional in Marbury v. Madison. [*Jill Lepore] Alexander Hamilton was incorrect in his assertion that the Judicial Branch is the least dangerous to political rights and the weakest of the three government branches because judicial review has made the Supreme Court more powerful than he had anticipated. From 1803 to today, the controversial practice of judicial activism in the Supreme Court has grown—as exemplified by the differing decisions in Minor v. Happersett and United States v. Virginia—which, in effect, has increased the power of the Supreme Court to boundaries beyond those that Alexander Hamilton stated in Federalist 78.
In Federalist no. 78 Hamilton explains the powers and duties of the judiciary department as developed in Article III of the Constitution. Article III of the Constitution is very vague on the structure of the federal courts. Hamilton had to convince Americans that the federal courts would not run amok. He presented that the federal courts would not have unlimited power but that they would play a vital role in the constitutional government. Hamilton limited judiciary power by defining it as a text-bound interpretative power. (R.B Bernstein) This essay was intended to endorse as well as interpret the Constitution.
One argument that the Anti-Federalists had against the forming of a new constitution was that they claimed it would “lead to a new consolidation system of government” and the leaders of Philadelphia intended “such a system and that the consolidated system would in the end destroy republican government and individual liberty as well as the independence of the states.” (Lewis 2) The Federalists feared that the government would have so much power it would be abused. They were constantly speculating about what would happen to the Unit...
According to Anthony Lewis, author of Gideon’s Trumpet, federalism is “the independence of the states in our federal system of government” (Lewis 89). In other words, federalism is the state’s power to make decisions for itself rather than the federal government making decisions for every state. The fate of federalism is discussed in the Supreme Court case Gideon v. Wainwright. In this case, Clarence Earl Gideon was arrested for burglary in Florida. When Gideon was tried, the court did not grant him a lawyer because, according to Florida state law, lawyers are only given in capital cases. Because Gideon believed he was not protected under the sixth amendment, he brought his case to the Supreme Court so that it can be decided if or if not all
among the nation's founders about the need for individual states to retain significant legislative authority and judicial autonomy separate from federal control. The reason why we have a dual-court system is, back then; new states joining the union were assured of limited federal intervention into local affairs. The state legislatures were free to create laws, and state court systems were needed to hear cases in which violations of those laws occurred. Today, however, state courts do not hear cases involving alleged violations of federal law, nor do federal courts involve themselves in deciding issues of state law unless there is a conflict between local or state statues and federal constitutional guarantees. When that happens, claimed violations of federal due process guarantees especially those found in the Bill of Rights.
“We live in the greatest nation on Planet Earth, but it is becoming more and more apparent that in order to keep it, the people must do something to stop the federal courts that are daily setting themselves above the law and dictating to us how we should live, and what we should think” (Sutherland M. et al p. 9, 2007) Those are the beginning words of the preface to the book Judicial Tyranny: The New Kings of America. The work expounds upon the idea that there is something fundamentally wrong with our country’s judicial system, especially when it comes to the Supreme Court. The main idea behind the book is that an unelected judicial branch has taken upon itself new powers and is legislating from the court bench without regard to the general consent of the people and our Constitutional process. The entire book comes from very Christian world vi...
In the early years of the Constitution the legislative and executive branches held the power to establish and enforce any laws. This was prevalent up until the Marbury v. Madison case in 1803. John Marshall, as the Chief Justice during the case, declared that the Judicial Act of 1801, appointing numerous federalist “midnight judges” to judicial positions in the government, was unconstitutional. By overruling a law passed by Congress itself, Marshall was able to prove the Supreme Court as a center of power that can even have precedence over Congress, the President, and all other courts if it is necessary to determine constitutionality. Also known as Judicial Review, this power was the base on which John Marshall build up the Supreme Court to be respected and equal to the other branches. The power of the Supreme Court and federal law was continued into the next major case, Fletcher v. Peck. When Georgia wanted the land they gave to the Yazoo Company back after elections, their government brought it to court. John Marshall and the Supreme Court declared that land grant contracts cannot be repealed and made contracts “sacred”. Marshall utilized the power of the Supreme Court to overrule the decision made by Georgia. The establishment of Judicial Review is prevalent in the outcome of Fletcher v. Peck in that the federal judiciary
The significant impact Robert Dahl’s article, “Decision-Making in a Democracy: the Supreme Court as a National Policy-Maker” created for our thought on the Supreme Court it that it thoroughly paved the way towards exemplifying the relationship between public opinion and the United States Supreme Court. Dahl significantly was able to provide linkages between the Supreme Court and the environment that surrounds it in order for others to better understand the fundamental aspects that link the two together and explore possible reasoning and potential outcomes of the Court.
In 1787 Article three of the constitution created the Supreme Court, but not until 1789 was it configured. The way it was originally set up was with one Chief Justice and five associate judges, with all six members being appointed for life. This court serves as the “supreme law of the land”, it has the power to determine if state or federal laws are in conflict with how the Court interprets the constitution.
The Supreme Court, which sees almost 150 petitions per week, called cert petitions, must carefully select the cases that they want to spend their time and effort on (Savage 981). If they didn’t select them carefully, the nine justices would quickly be overrun, so they have put in place a program to weed through the court cases to pick out the small number they will discuss. There are a few criteria that are used to judge whether or not a case will be tried. The first is whether or not the lower courts decided the case based on another one of the Supreme Court’s decisions for they will investigate these in order to withhold or draw back their conclusion that they made in their court case. Another is the case’s party alignment: sometimes the justices will pick cases that will align with their party beliefs, like trying to get a death row inmate off of his death sentence. They also make claims about the “life” of the case- the Supreme Court only hears “live” cases- they do not try to go back in time and re-mark a case that has long since been decided (Savage 981). Lastly, they like to take cases where the lower courts did not decide with one another -these cases can have t o do with interpretations of the law that have been left up to the lower courts and should be specifically defined by the Supreme Court (Savage 982).
The opposing argument serves as a perfect gateway to the topic of relationship between Federal and State government. In the United States, the Supremacy Clause serves...
The life of every American citizen, whether they realize it or not, is influenced by one entity--the United States Supreme Court. This part of government ensures that the freedoms of the American people are protected by checking the laws that are passed by Congress and the actions taken by the President. While the judicial branch may have developed later than its counterparts, many of the powers the Supreme Court exercises required years of deliberation to perfect. In the early years of the Supreme Court, one man’s judgement influenced the powers of the court systems for years to come. John Marshall was the chief justice of the Supreme Court from 1801 to 1835, and as the only lasting Federalist influence in a newly Democratic-Republican government, he and his fellow justices sought to perpetuate their Federalist principles in the United States’ court system. In one of the most memorable court cases of all time--the case of Marbury v. Madison-- Marshall established the idea of judicial review and strengthened the power of the judicial branch in the government. Abiding by his Federalist ideals, Marshall decided cases that would explicitly limit the power of the state government and broaden the strengths of the national government. Lastly, the Marshall Court was infamous for determining the results of cases that dealt with the interpretation of the Constitution and the importance of contracts in American society. The Marshall Court, over the span of a mere three decades, managed to influence the life of every American citizen even to this day by impacting the development of the judicial branch, establishing a boundary between the state and national government, and making declarations on the sanctity of contracts ("The Marshall Court"...
In 1789, the final draft of the constitution of the United States came into effect. In article three it calls for "[t]he judicial Power of the United States, shall be vested in one Supreme Court, and in such inferior Courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish." In the article it neither says the duties, powers, or any organization of the supreme court. If left this up to congress and to the justices of the court itself for these details.