We the People Speech: Unit 4 By Anushka Edlabadkar, Sophia Azab, Anvita Suresh, John Lee, Sathvi Seshan, and Tye Williams How was the Constitution used to establish our government? How was the Constitution used to establish our government? Articles 1, 2, and 3 setup 3 branches, the Judicial Branch is 1 of those branches. Its job is to interpret laws and the constitution, there are many powers the Judicial Branch has given to them by Act 3 of the Constitution.
One of the most if not the most important power is Judicial Review, this gives the Judicial Branch the power to rule whether a law passed by Congress and signed by the President is unconstitutional. How did the Supreme Court acquire the power of judicial review? The power of Judicial Review wasn’t established as a specific provision in the words of the Constitution but during the Supreme Court case of Marbury vs Madison (1803) as a check within the system of checks and balances created mainly by James Madison.
This system gave all branches of government powers to ensure that one branch of government could not become too powerful. This check allows the Judicial Branch to declare a law made by the Executive and Legislative Branch unconstitutional, rendering it void and null revoking all within that act. The power to use Judicial review upon acts made by the Executive and Legislative Branch was not established until the case of Marbury vs. Madison (1803) in which the the current president at the time, John Adams ppointed William Marbury to the office of Justice for Peace for the District of Columbia in his last hours as President. Under the next President’s orders (Thomas Jefferson) James Madison the Secretary of State didn’t deliver the papers required to give Marbury his position. Marbury then petitioned for his job with the Writ of Mandamus which made government officials carry out their duty making James Madison need to give Marbury his position, but the Supreme Court then ruled the Judicial Act of 1789 unconstitutional making the Writ of Mandamus null and void.
Therefore assuming powers over the Legislative and Executive Branch for the first time in a Supreme Court case. Do you think the Supreme Court should have the power to declare an act of congress unconstitutional? Why or why not? Our group believes that the U. S. Supreme Court should have the power to declare an act of congress unconstitutional. The reasoning is judicial review is one of the most important checks on the leg of the Executive Branch within the system of checks and balances.
If the Supreme Court could not use judicial review over acts of congress the judicial branch would have little power to stop congress from performing a unconstitutional act such as overruling the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment which gave all citizens the right to protection under the law, or ignoring the Civil Rights Act of 1964 which gave all people the rights equal to those of all citizens. How should justices determine the meaning of the words of the Constitution?
After conferring our group decided that the best way to interpret the constitution was to use “loose” construction which allows for the interpretation of the constitution to be as less strict to go exactly by the constitution. To determine this we looked for evidence that this style would work and found many convincing cases of this. One such was the Supreme Court case of McCulloch vs. Maryland (1819) in which the Supreme Court allowed the formation of the second bank of the U. S. nd denied the state of Maryland the right to tax it using loose construction over the “necessary and proper” clause of Article I, Section 8 of the constitution. Currently there is a vacancy in the Supreme Court that must be filled by a applicant elected by the current president (Barrack Obama) or once in power president elect Donald Trump.
If Mr. Trump presumable according to his statement saying “I’m on Antonin Scalia’s (a practitioner of strict interpretation) side 100 percent. will elect a Supreme Justice that follows his philosophy of interpretation (strict interpretation which makes decisions exclusively based on the exact words of the Constitution) such as Dianne S. Sykes, Don Willett and other candidates. In conclusion, the judicial branch has many powers and checks that allow for the equalization of powers between the branches of government. Nevertheless, this can lead to different interpretations of the constitution’s meaning. Follow-Up Questions: Is the power of judicial review essential to a constitutional government? Why or why not?
Do you believe that an independent judiciary is essential to good government? Describe one method of interpreting the Constitution. What are the strengths and weaknesses of this method? What checks are there on judicial review? Are they effective? Explain your position. If the Supreme Court did not act as an ultimate guardian of our political system as a part in the Constitution, what or who was served that purpose? Explain your answer. If the Supreme Court was not the highest court of the land in our government, then the Court of Appeals would serve that purpose in their absence.
Right below the Supreme Court, sits 13 appellate courts, called the U. S. Court of Appeals. There are 94 district level trial courts that are divided into 12 regional circuits, and each have a set of Appellate Courts. Appellate means concerned with or dealing with applications for decisions to be reversed. It also means of or having to do with appeals. The Appellate court’s job is to determine whether the laws passed are correctly applied to the trial. These courts have no jury but consist of three judges at trial.
They have the power to repeal decisions from the federal administrative agencies and deal with the challenges in the district courts and the circuit courts located within them. They can also hear appeals in separate and specialized cases, decided by the U. S. Court of International Trade and the U. S. Court of Federal Claims. In the Constitution, is an Appellate Jurisdiction Clause. “In all other cases before mentioned, the Supreme Court shall have appellate jurisdiction, both as to Law and Fact, with such Expectations, and under such Regulations as the Congress shall make.
Article III, Section 2, Clause 2. The Court of Appeals are an extremely essential part of the government, as stated in the Constitution. They exist as part of the judicial system to provide those ,who have been fought and made judgments against, to have the opportunity to have their case reviewed and properly studied. Because there is no jury, the Court of Appeals cannot decide any laws but can review them. The Court of Appeals is is the second highest court, responsible for interpreting the laws of the other branches of government, Legislative and Executive.
The Court of Appeals take the Supreme Court’s cases that are reasonable and can be easily ruled and decided, therefore can also take on other important cases usually handled by the Supreme Court. Some examples of cases the Court of Appeals would need to deal with are cases that deal with the constitutionality of law, most criminal cases, treaties of the U. S. , contract and family law cases, disputes between two states, bankruptcy, habeas corpus issues and conflicts with ambassadors/ ministers. Most of these court cases would be regularly heard at trial by the Supreme Court and some are already introduced to the Court of Appeals.
Their jobs often are involved when there is a dissatisfied side of the trial ,when a law was interpreted incorrectly, if a law violates what is stated in the Constitution, or if it is conducted unfairly. The litigants are the ones who have the right to call for an The litigants are the or overview or an appeal by the court. A litigant is the party that is engaged in the lawsuit. The petitioner brings the request while the respondent argues against the case in the court. Next, a lawyer is brought to lay out their opinions and facts.
After the case, the Court of Appeals is to review over the final decision made by the higher jurisdictions and make sure the petitioners request and the respondent’s argument is accurate and satisfied with the judge and other sides of the trial. The Supreme Court of the United States hears about 100 to 150 appeals in and with more than 7,000 cases. They are asked to review every year. So the decisions made by the 12 Circuit Courts of Appeals across the country and the Federal Circuit Court are responsible for the final decision and are the last say for thousands of cases.
The Constitution authorized the Congress to establish the lower court systems. They felt that the decisions made by the Supreme Court could have conflicts with other interests in court and that it is necessary to add another court system, right below the Supreme Court to go over each final decision made. Congress also assigned the Court of Appeals to regulate publicity issues and rumors for the Supreme Court in case of an emergency. In conclusion, the Court of Appeals would serve as the ultimate guardian of our political system because as stated in the Constitution and arranged by the Congress, they review the laws passed by the U. S. District Courts.
The power would be shifted and they would be able to rule laws constitutional or not. The Court of Appeals is the second highest court of the land and is a crucial foundation in protecting the rights of the people and studying the acts passed. Therefore, if the Supreme Court did not act as the highest court of our government, the U. S. Court of Appeals would act in their absence. If the Supreme Court has the power to declare laws null and void, should this power be clearly stated in the Constitution rather than been implied ? Why or why not?
