Merrick Garland Cases

Prior to this case there were two forms of gun control acts the first was that of 1968 which forbids gun sells to sell guns to people that have a felony charge that are mentally unstable and other things this was amended with the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act which included the need to have a background check. While working to make a system that could make the check fast it had to be done by state law enforcement. People however started to claim that this act was unconstitutional and it violated their rights given to them under the Constitution. The Petitioners filed separate actions challenging the constitutionality of the Brady Act’s interim provisions and in each case the District

President Obama publicly disagreed with the decision but could not change it. The President decides on nominations who are then put under scrutiny while he receives the ‘advise and consent’ of the Senate judiciary committee. There is therefore a small democratic link however it is very weak. Once a Justice is appointed they cannot be removed and are independent of the other political bodies this can be evidenced by Eisenhower’s appointments, a Republican conservative who appointed 2 liberal justices, something he regretted so much so that when asked if there were any regrets after his time in office he replied “I have made two mistakes, and they are both sitting on the Supreme Court”. As stated before the judiciary is independent and once Supreme Justices are appointed they cannot be fired or dismissed this leaves a huge deficit of accountability, a key factor of democracy.

Another issue DAPA faced was that Mitch McConnell delayed confirmation hearings of Merrick Garland. McConnell is the current Majority Leader in the Senate, and he argued that no president can appoint a Supreme Court Justice on an election year, even though it is nowhere stated in the United States Constitution. Under the Checks and Balances powers of the Legislative Branch, the Senate can deny confirmation of a Judge appointed by the Executive branch. The Senate cannot deny the confirmation hearing of a nominated Supreme Court Justice as this is one of the Executive branch’s constitutional rights.

Government advances court Judge Merrick Garland, left, converses with Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., on Capitol Hill.

The total amount of time that Garland’s nomination lasted for was 293 days.  This is the longest nomination for Supreme Court in history without getting a hearing from Senate Republicans. Critics say Republicans denied Garland a hearing for to keep a Democrat appointed justice of the Supreme Court.  The last appointee to have never gotten a hearing from the Sentate was in 1853.  Some people of the United States see this as a negative working relationship between the Senate and the President. The Senate should have at least considered this nomination, and then they could have voted no.  Even though the Senate wanted to preserve the court’s conservative majority the Senate should have just considered the nominee then they could have said their opinion on the nominee.  If they had considered the nominee they could have saved a lot of time and effort for everyone by voting no for the president’s

An exception was the chief of police, who could issue one-year licenses for handguns. They also required owners who had registered firearms were to have them unloaded or with some type of trigger lock. A Washington D.C. special police officer, Dick Anthony Heller, had a handgun while on duty, he had applied for the one-year license to keep a handgun in his house, but his application was denied. So, he then sued the District of Columbia and argued that they violated his Second Amendment right to keep a handgun in his house without a license. The district court dismissed the case. The U.S. court of appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit held that the Second Amendment protects the right to keep handguns in homes for the purpose of self-defense, and the District of Columbia’s requirement that nonfunctional handguns could be kept in homes violated that right. The U.S. Supreme Court decision upholding a federal district ruling that a Washington D.C. law banning

involved in this nomination was partially due to Bork’s extreme conservative ideology. It is easier for a president to have an individual nominated that is more moderate in their views. It is well understood that the president will nominate an individual with similar views, but the senate will rarely confirm someone they see as extreme.

In the 1960s and 70s, a number of commentators regarded Earl Warren as one of the greatest justices ever on the U.S. Supreme Court. Maybe, some contended, such as Associate Justice Thurgood Marshall, that he was the best chief justice we ever had (Belknap, 2005). But, in March, 1966, Warren turned 75. Two years later, in June, 1968, he informed President Johnson, first in person and then by letter, that he

Immediately consequent to being appointed, former U.S. President George W. Bush put across his thinking in regard to judicial appointments and made it clear that he intended this matter to be especially important when considering his administration's policies. It is very probable that the majority of voters chose to elect Bush as a president as a result of the fact that they were acquainted with his strategies in regard to the appointment of judges. His choices actually demonstrate that he was not necessarily interested in naming judges that would create a diverse environment, as he was actually concerned about appointing judges that would play a strategic role in the general state of affairs in the U.S.

“Remember, the next president we elect will appoint one justice immediately, and then be able to possibly appoint up to five more during his or her term. Those appointments are of paramount importance

President Obama’s judicial candidates look dissimilar from their predecessors. For example, the bulk of President Obama’s appointments are women and nonwhite males. Forty-two percent of his judgeships

Considering that Supreme Court Judges are appointed by the president, and subject to approval by the Senate, one would foresee scenarios where the president influences the Supreme Court by threatening the tenure of specific justices. In other words, the lifetime service, guards judges against retribution, based on decisions made against the views of the appointing authority. The term therefore echoes the words of Alexander Hamilton who emphasized permanency in office and the independency of office bearers (Cossack, 2000). A change of this policy would therefore be against the will of the founders of the nation and the country’s tradition that has been successful for the last two centuries.

In 2015, The US Supreme Court rejected a challenge by gun rights activists to an ordinance enacted by a Chicago suburb that bans assault weapons and large-capacity magazines. The refusal by the nine justices to hear the case, coming at a time of fierce debate over the nation's gun laws following a series of mass shootings, means that the 2013 ordinance passed by the city of Highland Park, Illinois remains in effect. The Highland Park regulation bans various semi-automatic weapons, including well-known guns such as the AR-15 and AK-47, in addition to any magazines that can hold more than 10 rounds of bullets. In April, the Chicago-based Seventh US Circuit Court of Appeals rejected the challenge, saying the ordinance does not violate the right to bear arms guaranteed by the US Constitution's Second Amendment. The Supreme Court has not taken up a major gun case since 2010. (Reuters News Agency, 2015)

To start with this topic, the first thing that we need to do is talk about who is Merrick Garland. Merrick Brian Garland is the chief judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. *At the conclusion of the trial, if the losing side is unhappy with the outcome, it is entitled as a matter of right to appeal its case to the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. There are thirteen circuit courts of appeals in the United States, also spread geographically through the states. A party losing an appeal at the circuit court level can appeal one more time to the U.S. Supreme Court for review, but given the extremely small odds of that appeal being granted, most federal litigation ends at the U.S. circuit court level.* He was

The performance of judges can be measured, generally speaking, by the ability of the judges. There are some methods used to measure the performances of judges for this purpose. These include a review of the past performance of the judges. Here, the judges are gauged according to citations to prior judgments, affirmation of the judges' by higher courts and the ability to produce and put pressure. The judges may also be measured by their native talents and experiences whereby issues of the number of years a particular judge has been working at the lower courts and the quality of the law school they might have attended. Another measure for the quality of judges is depreciating ability; some judges' performance may decline due to cognitive impairments, while others may gain experience over time. These measures are geared towards ensuring that a high quality of judicial performance is guaranteed and maintained (Choi et al, 2011).