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United States Constitutional Law
The constitutional law of the United States is the body of law governing the interpretation and implementation of the United States Constitution. The subject concerns the scope of power of the United States federal government compared to the individual states and the fundamental rights of individuals. The ultimate authority upon the interpretation of the Constitution and the constitutionality of statutes, state and federal, lies with the Supreme Court of the United States. The Supreme Court Judicial review Early in its history, in ''Marbury v. Madison'' (1803) and ''Fletcher v. Peck'' (1810), the Supreme Court of the United States declared that the judicial power granted to it by Article III of the United States Constitution included the power of judicial review, to consider challenges to the constitutionality of a State or Federal law. The holding in these cases empowered the Supreme Court to strike down enacted laws that were contrary to the Constitution. In this role, for ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
United States Constitution
The Constitution of the United States is the Supremacy Clause, supreme law of the United States, United States of America. It superseded the Articles of Confederation, the nation's first constitution, on March 4, 1789. Originally including seven articles, the Constitution delineates the frame of the Federal government of the United States, federal government. The Constitution's first three articles embody the doctrine of the separation of powers, in which the federal government is divided into three branches: the United States Congress, legislative, consisting of the bicameralism, bicameral Congress (Article One of the United States Constitution, Article I); the Federal government of the United States#Executive branch, executive, consisting of the President of the United States, president and subordinate officers (Article Two of the United States Constitution, Article II); and the Federal judiciary of the United States, judicial, consisting of the Supreme Court of the Unit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mootness (law)
The terms moot, mootness and moot point are used both in English and in American law, although with significantly different meanings. In the legal system of the United States, a matter is "moot" if further legal proceedings with regard to it can have no effect, or events have placed it beyond the reach of the law. Thereby the matter has been deprived of practical significance or rendered purely academic. The U.S. development of this word stems from the practice of moot courts, in which hypothetical or fictional cases were argued as a part of legal education. These purely academic settings led the U.S. courts to describe cases where developing circumstances made any judgment ineffective as "moot". The mootness doctrine can be compared to the ripeness doctrine, another court rule (rather than law), that holds that judges should not rule on cases based entirely on anticipated disputes or hypothetical facts. These rules and similar doctrines, taken together, prevent the fe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Federalism
Federalism is a mode of government that combines a general level of government (a central or federal government) with a regional level of sub-unit governments (e.g., provinces, State (sub-national), states, Canton (administrative division), cantons, territorial, territories, etc.), while dividing the powers of governing between the two levels of governments. Two illustrative examples of federated countries—one of the world's oldest federations, and one recently organized—are Australia #Government and politics, Australia and Federated States of Micronesia, Micronesia. Johannes Althusius (1563–1638), is considered the father of modern federalism, along with Montesquieu. In 1603, Althusius first described the bases of this political philosophy in his ''Politica Methodice Digesta, Atque Exemplis Sacris et Profanis Illustrata''. By 1748, in his treatise ''The Spirit of Law'', Montesquieu (1689-1755) observed various examples of federalist governments: in corporate societies, i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
Joan Ruth Bader Ginsburg ( ; Bader; March 15, 1933 – September 18, 2020) was an American lawyer and jurist who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1993 until Death and state funeral of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, her death in 2020. She was nominated by President Bill Clinton to replace retiring justice Byron White, and at the time was viewed as a moderate consensus-builder. Ginsburg was the first Jewish woman and the second woman to serve on the Court, after Sandra Day O'Connor. During her tenure, Ginsburg authored the majority opinions in cases such as ''United States v. Virginia''(1996), ''Olmstead v. L.C.''(1999), ''Friends of the Earth, Inc. v. Laidlaw Environmental Services, Inc.''(2000), and ''City of Sherrill v. Oneida Indian Nation of New York''(2005). Later in her tenure, Ginsburg received attention for passionate dissents that reflected Ideological leanings of United States Supreme Court justices, liberal views of the law. Gin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Felix Frankfurter
Felix Frankfurter (November 15, 1882 – February 22, 1965) was an American jurist who served as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1939 until 1962, advocating judicial restraint. Born in Vienna, Frankfurter immigrated with his family to New York City at age 12. He graduated from Harvard Law School and worked for Henry L. Stimson, the U.S. Secretary of War. Frankfurter served as Judge Advocate General during World War I. Afterward, he returned to Harvard and helped found the American Civil Liberties Union. He later became a friend and adviser of President Franklin D. Roosevelt. After Benjamin N. Cardozo died in 1938, Roosevelt nominated Frankfurter to the Supreme Court. Given his affiliations and alleged radicalism, the Senate confirmed Frankfurter's appointment only after its Judiciary Committee required him to testify in 1939, a practice that became routine in the 1950s. His relations with colleagues were strained by ideological and perso ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. (March 8, 1841 – March 6, 1935) was an American jurist who served as an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court from 1902 to 1932.Holmes was Acting Chief Justice of the United States in February 1930. Holmes is one of the most widely cited and influential Supreme Court justices in American history, noted for his long tenure on the Court and for his pithy opinionsparticularly those on civil liberties and American constitutional democracyand deference to the decisions of elected legislatures. Holmes retired from the Court at the age of 90, an unbeaten record for oldest justice on the Supreme Court.John Paul Stevens was only eight months younger when he retired on April 12, 2010. He previously served the Union as a brevet colonel in the American Civil War (in which he was wounded three times), as an associate justice and chief justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, and as Weld Professor of Law at his alma mater, Harvard Law ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Judicial Restraint
Judicial restraint is a judicial interpretation that recommends favoring the ''status quo'' in judicial activities and is the opposite of judicial activism. Aspects of judicial restraint include the principle of '' stare decisis'' (that new decisions should be consistent with previous decisions); a conservative approach to standing (''locus standi'') and a reluctance to grant ''certiorari;'' and a tendency to deliver narrowly tailored verdicts, avoiding “unnecessary resolution of broad questions.” Judicial restraint may lead a court to avoid hearing a case in the first place. The court may justify its decision by questioning whether the plaintiff has standing; or by refusing to grant ''certiorari;'' or by determining that the central issue of the case is a political question better decided by the executive or legislative branches of government; or by determining that the court has no jurisdiction in the matter. Judicial restraint may lead a court to decide in favor of t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Stephen Breyer
Stephen Gerald Breyer ( ; born August 15, 1938) is an American lawyer and retired jurist who served as an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court from 1994 until his retirement in 2022. He was nominated by President Bill Clinton, and replaced retiring justice Harry Blackmun. Breyer was generally associated with the liberal wing of the Court. Since his retirement, he has been the Byrne Professor of Administrative Law and Process at Harvard Law School. Born in San Francisco, Breyer attended Stanford University and the University of Oxford, and graduated from Harvard Law School in 1964. After a clerkship with Associate Justice Arthur Goldberg in 1964–65, Breyer was a law professor and lecturer at Harvard Law School from 1967 until 1980. He specialized in administrative law, writing textbooks that remain in use today. He held other prominent positions before being nominated to the Supreme Court, including special assistant to the United States assistant attorney gener ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Purposivism
The purposive approach (sometimes referred to as purposivism, purposive construction, purposive interpretation, or the modern principle in construction) is an approach to statutory and constitutional interpretation under which common law courts interpret an enactment (a statute, part of a statute, or a clause of a constitution) within the context of the law's purpose. Purposive interpretation is a derivation of mischief rule set in '' Heydon's Case'', and intended to replace the mischief rule, the plain meaning rule and the golden rule. Purposive interpretation is used when the courts use extraneous materials from the pre-enactment phase of legislation, including early drafts, hansards, committee reports, and white papers. Israeli jurist Aharon Barak views purposive interpretation as a legal construction that combines subjective and objective elements.Barak, Aharon. ''Purposive Interpretation In Law''. Princeton University Press (New Jersey), 2005, p. 88 Barak states that the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Clarence Thomas
Clarence Thomas (born June 23, 1948) is an American lawyer and jurist who has served since 1991 as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. President George H. W. Bush nominated him to succeed Thurgood Marshall. After Marshall, Thomas is the second African American to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court and has been its longest-serving member since Anthony Kennedy's retirement in 2018. He has also been the Court's oldest member since Stephen Breyer retired in 2022. Thomas was born in Pin Point, Georgia. After his father abandoned the family, he was raised by his grandfather in a poor Gullah community near Savannah, Georgia. Growing up as a devout Catholic, Thomas originally intended to be a priest in the Catholic Church but became dissatisfied with its efforts to combat racism and abandoned his aspiration to join the clergy. He graduated with honors from the College of the Holy Cross in 1971 and earned his Juris Doctor in 1974 from Yale Law School. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Antonin Scalia
Antonin Gregory Scalia (March 11, 1936 – February 13, 2016) was an American jurist who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1986 until his death in 2016. He was described as the intellectual anchor for the originalist and textualist position in the U.S. Supreme Court's conservative wing. For catalyzing an originalist and textualist movement in American law, he has been described as one of the most influential jurists of the twentieth century, and one of the most important justices in the history of the Supreme Court. Scalia was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2018, and the Antonin Scalia Law School at George Mason University was named in his honor. Scalia was born in Trenton, New Jersey. A devout Catholic, he attended the Jesuit Xavier High School before receiving his undergraduate degree from Georgetown University. Scalia went on to graduate from Harvard Law School and spent six years at Jones Da ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Originalism
Originalism is a legal theory in the United States which bases constitutional, judicial, and statutory interpretation of text on the original understanding at the time of its adoption. Proponents of the theory object to judicial activism and other interpretations related to a living constitution framework. Instead, originalists argue for democratic modifications of laws through the legislature or through constitutional amendment. Originalism consists of a family of different theories of constitutional interpretation and can refer to original intent or original meaning. Critics of originalism often turn to the competing concept of the Living Constitution, which asserts that a constitution should evolve and be interpreted based on the context of current times. Originalism should not be confused with strict constructionism. Contemporary originalism emerged during the 1980s and greatly influenced American legal culture, practice, and academia. Over time, originalism becam ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
