Judicial Review : The United States

The federal government, as you know, is made up of 3 branches. The three branches of government are legislative, executive, and judicial. According to page 197 in the history textbook it states, " Our national's judicial power resides in 'one Supreme Court' " this is known as the judicial branch. What the judicial branch does, the political significance of the judicial branch, and the relations with other branches are all important things to know about the judicial branch. The judicial branch is crucial to our government because it can declares actions of legislature unconstitutional.

The Judicial Branch is the balancing factor of the Government. It is the listener of the people of the US and it decides on all matters regarding the people. It "interprets the nation's law" (World Book 141). Being able to interpret the law gives the Judicial branch a special kind of power. One of which the Executive Branch and the Legislative Branch do not possess. The Judicial branch decides when a law has been broken, to what extent, and how to punish the criminal act. And that is what makes it the strongest branch.

The United States judicial branch to the general American public can seem insulated from politics, because of their adversarial system, that does not allow judges to choose their cases. The judicial branch unlike, their two counterparts, the legislative and executive at large rely on the respect of the American people and the heads of the two other branches. In appointing members of the federal judiciary, Presidents appoint members who resemble their political ideologies and their likelihood of confirmation in the Senate, the Senate confirms these members based on their performance on the litmus test and Senatorial courtesy. Courts, specifically the Supreme Court, make decisions based on the Constitution, but the legislative branch has the

Judicial review is the power of the Supreme Court of the United States to review actions taken by the Congress and the President and decide whether or not those actions are legal under the Constitution. The appointment process serves as a check and balance on the judicial branch because the members of the other two branches select the members of the judicial branch. They choose the Supreme Court justices and all federal court judges. The president and Congress, therefore, have the freedom and ability to shape the Supreme Court. Unfortunately, the framers' intentions are not made sufficiently clear to provide easy answers on judicial review. The book states, “In recent decades, the court have, more often than not, upheld presidential power

The concept of Judicial Review is to review cases using the power of the courts over the actions of the executive and legislative branches to deem them invalid or unconstitutional. The Supreme Court has a unique position because of its broad commitment to the American People and its Constitution. The Court's principles on judicial review are that The Constitution is the supreme law of the country, they have ultimate authority on constitutional matters, and they must vote against any law that clashes with the constitution. One of the most significant cases that brought forth such convictions was the case of Marbury vs. Madison in 1803. Which was a case that brought many complications because when Jefferson ordered his Secretary of State James

Judicial Review is one of the court's most important powers and arguably the most powerful one that this branch or any branch has. This is a power that allows the supreme court to make legislative and executive actions subject to review and possible invalidation. The power of Judicial Review was earned in the Supreme Court Case Marbury v. Madison. In this case it was decided that James Madison’s decisions to prevent William Marbury from taking office as justice of the peace was unconstitutional, this has extended the power and now created what is known as judicial review. This has continued to affect laws and acts presently such as in the case of United States v. Nixon when Nixon was denied the powers of absolute executive privilege due to

Since the establishment of our government the Judiciary branch has been intended to be the passive or least dangerous of the three branches; this can be seen in the Federalist Papers, said by Alexander Hamilton, “The Judiciary, on the contrary, has no influence over either the sword or the purse” (Woll 373). This was soon thwarted when the power of judicial review came into play. Judicial review gave the Supreme Court the power it needed to be as influential and powerful as the other two branches. Throughout history judicial has been key in many controversial and important court case, beginning with Marbury vs. Madison, which established judicial review, to many other case including McCulloch vs. Maryland, Plessy vs. Ferguson, Roe vs. Wade,

There are three different branches in the government. In these six different scenarios that were given in this prompt. The legislative branch represents the Congress. The congress is led by the House of Representatives and the Senate. What these two figures in this branch do is make the laws of the state. They have the power to pass laws, agree on treaties, and originate on spending bills. In the Executive Branch, it is represented by the president. In this branch the President has the power to propose laws, is in charge of the military, and has the right to veto laws. Last but not least the Judicial Branch, is represented by Federal Judges. They are appointed by the president and confirmed by the senate. In other words the Judicial Branch enforces the laws and makes sure people are following them as they should be (Branch, no date ).

The Constitution of the United States, the most remarkable document that was ever created. In this document, it clearly outlines the government that the United States will operate under and gave the leaders specific ways to guide the citizens of the country. For instance, in the Constitution, it established a judicial branch and outlined the laws that it will possessed. According to the Constitution, the judicial branch should act as a system of checks and balances against the other two branches of government. Under these circumstances, there are various courts that are created.

Madison wrote that, as far as political powers and the branches of government were concerned, “ambition must be made to counteract ambition” (Principles and Practice of American Politics, Federalist 51, p. 72). Ambition certainly counteracts ambition within the Senate itself, as is demonstrated by polarization and compromise, but ambition also acts as a balancing force between the Congress and the Supreme Court. When the president nominates potential justices, it is the job of Congress to carry out hearings and approve (or disapprove) the candidate (The Logic of American Politics, p. 390). Congress also has the power to determine the number of justices on the Supreme Court, and it is their job to add spaces on the bench as they see fit (The Logic of American Politics, p. 371). One of the more important functions of the Supreme Court is judicial review, which gives the Supreme Court the power to declare acts of Congress unconstitutional. Although this power is never explicitly stated in the Constitution, it is implied in Article III, and is mentioned in Federalist 78 (The Logic of American Politics, p. 361). Madison noted, “it is not possible to give each department an equal power of self defense. In republican government, the legislative authority necessarily predominates” (Principles and Practice of American Politics, Federalist 51, p. 73). The Judicial Branch was designated as the “weakest” branch from its beginning, and was created to concern itself with “neither force nor will, but merely judgment.” Judicial review serves as protection for the American people from the abuses of Congressional power (Principles and Practice of American Politics, Federalist 78, p. 416-417). Just as Congress and the Supreme Court balance each other through structure and representation, they each also balance the actions and decisions of the

The judicial branch plays many roles in interpreting the constitution and implementing public policy. As first order, the judicial branch has gain the powers, over the years, to declare laws passed by Congress unconstitutional and pledge them to be null and void. Judges from courts usually are strict constructionist, or they depend solely on personal ideology. If they do not base their court cases off of personal ideology, then they use previous cases which have occurred before. Judges try and find cases previous to those brought up and connect them in a special way. The connection allows them to have similar rulings. Doing so is called stare decisis. This ultimately allows them to refer back to old cases and their rulings, or establish a new

It is the only branch within our government that has “the ability to overrule the people’s elected representatives by declaring legislation or executive acts to be unconstitutional” (Hudson, 72). Essentially, it gives the judges the right to interpret the constitution and when laws are passed by federal and state legislatures that they feel violate the Constitution, they can strike them down using judicial review (Rosen). Although this has “long been criticized as an anti-democratic institution” because “it exercises control, not in behalf of the prevailing majority, but against it” (Rosen), it really is preserving democracy. It preserves the foundation of the Constitution, which represents the will of the people, “while the federal and state laws merely represented the will of the people's temporary and fallible representatives” (Rosen). For these reasons, it is important that the judges can therefore interpret the constitution without fear of retribution. The process of being unelected, having life tenure, the inability to be removed from bench and constant salaries allows “them to make unpopular decisions without fear of retribution either from those who appointed them or from the public at large”(Hudson, 71). These unpopular decisions that need to be made in order to protect our lives, property, and rights, not only sincerely looking out for the people, but also making us a

The power of judicial review is certainly a power that should not be taken for granted, though it seems over the past few decades it has. Without judicial review, other branches of the government would likely have performed acts that would be deemed unconstitutional. Jefferson did not wish for federalists to continue holding judgeships, or new ones to come forth for that matter, and ordered Madison to withhold these commissions. Thus, Marbury, one of the would-be appointees, sued leading to the case of Marbury v. Madison. The case of Marbury v. Madison provided a clearer picture as to why such a power as judicial review be set in place. Marshall saw this as an opportunity for growth in regards to the power of the Court as well as to interpret

Among the three branches of government, the branch that had received the least amount of attention was the Judiciary. Compared to the other two branches, the Judiciary is rarely discussed in great detail. Federalists like Alexander Hamilton argue that this is because the Judicial branch has significantly the least amount of power. However, Brutus of the Anti-Federalist party argues that the Judiciary’s power of constitutional review can impact the power of the other the branches. While Hamilton and Brutus agree that constitutional review led by the Judiciary is necessary, they disagree on the extent of its power and whether or not it needs to be controlled.

In the early years of the eighteenth Century, the young United States of America were slowly adapting to the union and the way the country was governed. And just like the nation, the governmental powers were starting to develop. Since the creation of the Constitution and due to the Connecticut Compromise, there is the Executive, the Legislative and the Judicial Power. But the existence of those powers was not always that natural. In these crucial times, the Judicial Power had problems controlling the other powers. It was a challenge for the Supreme Court to exercise the powers granted by the new Constitution. The Federal Government was not generally appreciated and its formation also caused many disagreements and debates from early