Solicitors General Influence Supreme Court Justices

Judicial activism is used by judges that favor the Court’s employing the power of judicial review to overturn state and federal laws. A criticism of judicial activist is the fact that judges rule cases in a way that reflects their political or personal preferences. Because judges tend to each hold different political and personal views, judicial activism can result in messy, political controversy. Another popular criticism of judicial activism is that unelected judges are “legislating from the bench” and are engaging in the type of lawmaking that should be reserved for elected legislators. The question remains whether a group of unelected judges with a life tenure should overturn laws that are passed by elected representatives. A strength of Judicial activists is the fact that Judges broadly interpret the Constitution and believe that law should adapt to changing conditions. Judges that favor judicial activism tend to be liberal Democrats.

A judicial originalist “holds that judges should decide the cases before them solely through application of principles derived from the written text of the Constitution” and views that “any interpretation…should be based on the ‘original intent’ of the framers” (88). This contrasts with a judicial pragmatist, who

I believe that we need statesmanship on the Supreme Court. Statesmanship is developed in the hard knocks of a general experience, private and public. Naturally, a man occupying the post must be competent in the law—and Warren has had seventeen years of practice in public law, during which his record was one of remarkable accomplishment and success, to say nothing of dedication. He has been very definitely a liberal-conservative; he represents the kind of political, economic, and social thinking that I believe we need on Supreme Court. Finally, he has a national name for integrity, uprightness, and courage that, again, I believe we need on the Court (Cray,

The process of choose and approve a supreme court justice is a process clearly defined within the constitution. First, it starts with the president. The United States president, according to the constitution, must be the one to nominate possible choices to fill the seat. After that, the nomination must by confirmed by the Senate. All supreme court justices have life long terms, so there will never be a single president that must make all the appointments. If a president if put in a situation where he or she must put in nominate a justice, it can be a very lengthy process. The selection criteria can range anywhere from experience to political ideology.

Throughout the book, Rosen analyzes specific traits of judges- such as political parties and appointment reason and so on. Rosen uses direct quotes from the judges to identify how judges have to lean away from certain beliefs and lean towards other beliefs for the sake of keeping the country free and under control. In each section, Rosen compares two justices and obviously favors one over the other. But, as the author, he does recognize the flaws in his view, and the pros in the opposite view. Rosen clearly favors justices who promote harmony in the court and create rulings with unanimous decisions. But, Rosen will always comment on something positive about a judge he does not favor, and will comment on something negative on the justice he does favor, balancing himself out. Another key factor that informs the reader about how the law came about to be how it is today is by judicial temperament. Rosen uses this as a key point while comparing the justices. Judicial Temperament describes the judge’s general attitude towards the law, and other judges. He states, “If the pairings of judicial temperaments in this book suggest anything, it is that courting attention and partisan approval in the short term is no guarantee of judicial respect in the long term” (Rosen). This means that while comparing and contrasting temperaments that whenever something is decided, it doesn’t mean it will stay and

There are many justices in Supreme Court. The judgement of the Justices is how the court voices their opinions.

Many scholars use Martin and Quinn scores to measure the preferences of U.S. Supreme Court Justices. But people are still not convinced that these measurements captures all the preference changes over a period. The scores in Marin and Quinn indicates that the present court system of today, are most conservative in over 60 years. Furthermore, Martin and Quinn scores advised scholars to utilize ordinal measurement scores although this may be true that Ho and Quinn’s admonition would undermine virtually as generation of empirical court research and leave most important test questions about Judicial Politics unanswered. However, the questions that mostly comes up is if whether the court

The legitimacy of the courts is paramount to their political power and thus when it is threatened by negative public connotations of impartiality and/or the usual political quid pro quo attitude the courts lose their ability to be perceived as impartial and legitimate, essentially neutering their political power. Specific political tactics common in the senate and congressional races such as attack ads, campaign contributions, and policy pronouncements by candidates (for judicial office) can potentially lead the public to regard the courts as another political actor which is exactly what they are not supposed to be. This paper examines the impact of campaign activity on the perceived impartiality of the courts, the author does this because he believes impartiality is a key source of judicial legitimacy. The author, James L. Gibson, goes on to argue that for the judicial system to work as “planned” they must be perceived as unbiased and legitimate. The author states that it is beneficial for courts when they are viewed by the public as legitimate and impartial.

I do not believe that politics plays a role in a Judge’s decision if that Judge is from the lower courts. When you start looking at the judges of higher courts it does play a role in their decision, a small roll, but a role none the less. We have collected data on thousands of sitting state and federal judges in the United States for nearly twenty years using controlled experiments. We present judges with a single hypothetical case so that large numbers of judges respond to the same situation. We have collected this data for other purposes, but we commonly ask judges participating in our research to identify their political orientation. This methodology enables us to examine how judges with different political affiliations evaluate the same case. Because most of our studies involve trial judges rather than appellate judges, we also

A judicial process involves a series of rules undertaken to administer justice through a system of courts defined in a given constitutional law. The lawyers and the interest groups are important actors in any judicial process, (The U.S. Department of State publication, 2008). In the United States, a plaintiff or a defendant has a constitutional right to a fair hearing before judgement. The litigants would always need the lawyers to build their defence or prosecutions cases before the judge or jury. The interest groups are known for influencing the judicial process. In the United States, the interest groups have such as influenced the judges’ appointment, just as a single form of influence. This paper describes in details the roles of the lawyers and interest groups in the judicial process. In addition to the roles, the paper seeks to explain the reasons behind unpopularity of lawyers in the United States since colonial years to present day; the impact of stratification in the legal profession on delivery and quality of legal services provision and how an impartial and unbiased system can allow interest groups to take part in the judicial process.

The first method or mode for the appointment of judges which will firstly be discusses is the election of judges by the people or also known as popular election (direct election). (Gilchrist, 1921) When speaking of popular election, what will come across our mind is that the election will be appointed through party election; whereby various political party contests in a direct election or poll. During this period of election, each political party may nominate a candidate for the position of judge. Besides than provide support in term of political party image or ‘brand’; political party also provide other assistance such as financial support, campaign and others. The assistance and support given by the political party is crucially important to ensure that the candidates nominated by the political party will be able to won the election against other candidates from their opponent. Through the assistance provided by the political party, it is clearly reflected that the candidate which contest for the office of judges, is highly depending on the political party and electorates. This highly-reliance relationship of judges over the electorate and political party is a dangerous threat to the impartiality and independence of the judicial body. This is because, in making decision, the judge which is elected by the people, need to ensure that the decision made fulfill and reflects the view and opinion of the people. (Gilchrist, 1921) Due to the fact that

The House of Lords’ outlook concerning the doctrine of precedent is reflected in Lord Woolf’s statement in the case of R v Simpson [2003] . The excerpt brings up the practice of the courts, and how the rules of precedent ‘had to be applied bearing in mind that their objective was to assist in the administration of justice’, as well as precedential certainty and flexibility. The dicta used in his lengthy statement leaves space for discussion, such as; the precedent ‘assisting’ the administration of justice, the ‘appropriate degree’ of certainty that precedent carries. There is also room for examination as to just how far flexibility in precedent serves a positive purpose to meet contemporary needs.

It’s important to understand how judges come to their decisions, as it can often be more than just simply applying legal principles to get to the relevant solution. It is common for there to be many potential outcomes to a case, and these outcomes shape the way in which laws shift and change thus having a profound impact on society as a whole- our laws are what define our civilization, values, beliefs, and morality. As Lord Dyson stated: “The business of judging often involves a choice between different conclusions, any of which it may be possible to reach by respectable legal reasoning. The choice made is likely to be motivated at a far deeper level by the judge’s own approach to the law”. This essay will cover the role of reasoning in judicial decision-making; how it allows judges to interpret statute and precedent, as well as leading the way for reform and the establishing of new case law. It will also cover the limitations of reasoning, some of which help keep the balance of power in check- Such as binding precedent and the rule of law, as well as other subconscious factors that may influence a judge’s ability to use reason when making a decision.

I further explore other limitations of political connections in litigation. I find that political connections are less effective in complex litigation, which is typically associated with multiple plaintiffs, a high quality of evidence, and increased media scrutiny. In these cases,

Jurisdiction, is concern with the authority of a court to hear and decide legal disputes and to enforce its ruling. Moreover, the U.S. Supreme Court Jurisdiction is divided into original and appellate jurisdiction. Original jurisdiction is the power of a court to try and decide upon it. On the contrary, appellate jurisdiction is the legal authority granted by a superior court to review and render upon the decision. Also, the case must be appropriate for the Supreme Court to consider it justiciable. There are five main components that relates to justiciability. First of all, advisory opinion is an opinion issued by a court that provides the details on how it would rule on a question of law. The second component of justiciability is collusive suits. Collusive suits states that the court will not decide cases in which the litigants want the same outcome, evince no real adversity between them, or are merely testing the law. Moreover, mootness is when the Courts do not decide cases in which the controversy is no longer alive. The DeFunis v. Odegaard (1974) case provides a perfect example of mootness. Ripeness consist of a nonjusticiable if the controversy is premature for review. A good illustration of ripeness is demonstrated in International Longshoremen’s Union v. Boyd (1954). Finally, political questions is mainly concern with the Court realizes that there a specific questions that the will not address, because they are better solved by other branches of government. Moreover,