The video on the history of the supreme court as well as what
goes on behind the process of determining its rulings was enlightening. It
showcased not only the workings behind the most powerful judicial court the
world has ever seen, but what the personal experiences are like for those
prestigious justices.
The supreme court itself is the ultimate judiciary court of
the United States, tasked with determining federal court cases based on the
writing of the constitution. The nine supreme court justices are the impartial
body that makes up the overarching court in the judiciary branch, who hold the
final decision over any case from a lower court that would happen to reach them.
The leader of the supreme court is the supreme court justice, who as the overarching
justice leads the court’s conference meetings each week.
To become a justice of the supreme court, one has to be
nominated by the President, and then has to be approved by a vote in the Senate.
If a justice nominee is approved by the senate, they only serve one term; a
lifetime term. This means they are on the supreme court until they either die,
or wish to retire.
Just as the court has the right to make all final decisions
on any federal court case, they also have the right to chose whichever case they
feel is worthy of their deliberation. They receive over seven thousand possible
cases a year, and only chose around 100 of those cases. These cases are
typically brought to their attention through a petition by someone from a lower
court hearing, asking for the supreme court to order a writ of certiorari,
which is essentially the supreme court demanding the lower court for the case. These
cases are chosen if only four out of the nine judges feel it is worthy of being
deliberated upon. This is a significant representation of how selective the
court is, and just what kind of case is deemed worthy of being selected. The
court will choose cases based on if they are significant enough that they
debate matters of the constitution, which thereby effects the large majority of
the country.
A supreme court hearing appears similar to a typical court
hearing. Each side in the case will provide their legal briefs and present them
to the court, as well as their oral arguments, which they have exactly 30
minutes to present. The biggest difference is that you’re presenting your
argument in front of a whopping nine justices, and they are all asking
questions surrounding the case and their argument during this 30-minute presentation.
It puts a lot of pressure on the lawyers who are typically used to a one judge
(maybe a three or five judge) court session.
Once they’ve heard everything, they have to decide on the
case. Once that’s done, the chief justice chooses another to write an opinion,
or explanation, of why the court decided the way that they did. This takes
about 4 weeks to complete.
One thing that I really took away from the video is that the
supreme court has this larger than life appeal to it. They’re clearly not
actually larger than life, but they hold the power of determining parts of the
ways in which we are supposed to conduct ourselves every day. What they determine
in their conferences and opinions affect each and every one of us, and it’s crazy
to me how they are just nine people. It seems so easy to be corrupted by
personal bias and outside forces in when you hold that much power, and its
impressive how they still hold faith in so many people as a true impartial body.
No comments:
Post a Comment