Judges Commons^™

Depoliticizing The Supreme Court: How To Rein In Those Answerable To No One?, Dana Ortiz-Tulla ,Esq

Journal of Race, Gender, and Ethnicity

This Note will discuss some of the Commission’s findings and other interesting suggestions to determine whether it is possible to rein in the modern-day Court. Part I will explain the inherently political nature of the Supreme Court. Part II will briefly present how the Supreme Court acquired its power. Part III will discuss several prominent proposals for Supreme Court reform. Finally, Part IV will examine whether any recommendations may depoliticize the Court.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Wise Legal Giant, Thomas A. Schweitzer

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

The People's Court: On The Intellectual Origins Of American Judicial Power, Ian C. Bartrum

Dickinson Law Review (2017-Present)

This article enters into the modern debate between “consti- tutional departmentalists”—who contend that the executive and legislative branches share constitutional interpretive authority with the courts—and what are sometimes called “judicial supremacists.” After exploring the relevant history of political ideas, I join the modern minority of voices in the latter camp.

This is an intellectual history of two evolving political ideas—popular sovereignty and the separation of powers—which merged in the making of American judicial power, and I argue we can only understand the structural function of judicial review by bringing these ideas together into an integrated whole. Or, put another way, …

Hearing The States, Anthony Johnstone

Pepperdine Law Review

The 2016 Presidential and Senate elections raise the possibility that a conservative, life-tenured Supreme Court will preside for years over a politically dynamic majority. This threatens to weaken the public’s already fragile confidence in the Court. By lowering the political stakes of both national elections and its own decisions, federalism may enable the Court to defuse some of the most explosive controversies it hears. Federalism offers a second-best solution, even if neither conservatives nor liberals can impose a national political agenda. However, principled federalism arguments are tricky. They are structural, more prudential than legal or empirical. Regardless of ideology, a …

What Are The Judiciary’S Politics?, Michael W. Mcconnell

Pepperdine Law Review

What are the politics of the federal judiciary, to the extent that the federal judiciary has politics? Whose interests do federal judges represent? This Essay puts forward five different kinds of politics that characterize the federal judiciary. First, the federal judiciary represents the educated elite. Second, the federal judiciary represents past political majorities. Third, the federal judiciary is more politically balanced than the legislative or executive branches. Fourth, the federal judiciary is organized by regions, and between those regions there is significant diversity. Fifth, to the extent that the judiciary leans one way or the other, it leans toward the …

Nothing New Under The Sun: The Law-Politics Dynamic In Supreme Court Decision Making, Stephen M. Feldman

Pepperdine Law Review

Recent events have seemed to inject politics into American judicial institutions. As a result, many observers worry that the Supreme Court, in particular, has become politicized. According to this view, the Justices should decide cases in accordance with the rule of law and be unmoved by political concerns. These worries arise from a mistaken assumption: that law and politics can be separate and independent in the process of judicial decision making. But at the Supreme Court (as well as in the lower courts, for that matter), decision making arises from a law-politics dynamic. Adjudication in accord with a pure rule …

Modeling The Congressional End-Run Constraint, Luke M. Milligan

University of Richmond Law Review

No abstract provided.

Dear President Bush: Leaving A Legacy On The Federal Bench, Carl Tobias

University of Richmond Law Review

No abstract provided.

Friction By Design: The Necessary Contest Of State Judicial Power And Legislative Policymaking, Michael L. Buenger

University of Richmond Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Double Standard In Judicial Selection, Edwin Meese Iii

University of Richmond Law Review

No abstract provided.

Brown And Lawrence (And Goodridge), Michael J. Klarman

Michigan Law Review

One year shy of the fiftieth anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education, the Justices issued another equality ruling that is likely to become a historical landmark. In Lawrence v. Texas, the Court invalidated a state law that criminalized same-sex sodomy. This article contrasts these historic rulings along several dimensions, with the aim of shedding light on how Supreme Court Justices decide cases and how Court decisions influence social reform movements. Part I juxtaposes Brown and Lawrence to illustrate how judicial decisionmaking often involves an uneasy reconciliation of traditional legal sources with broader social and political mores and …

Judicial Confirmation Wars: Ideology And The Battle For The Federal Courts, Sheldon Goldman

University of Richmond Law Review

No abstract provided.

Choosing Justices: A Political Appointments Process And The Wages Of Judicial Supremacy, John C. Yoo

Michigan Law Review

William H. Rehnquist is not going to be Chief Justice forever - much to the chagrin of Republicans, no doubt. In the last century, Supreme Court Justices have retired, on average, at the age of seventy-one after approximately fourteen years on the bench. By the end of the term of the President we elect this November, Chief Justice Rehnquist will have served on the Supreme Court for thirty-two years and reached the age of eighty. The law of averages suggests that Chief Justice Rehnquist is likely to retire in the next presidential term. In addition to replacing Chief Justice Rehnquist, …