The US Supreme Court: Reflection

 

 

After watching and reflecting on this video there were numerous facts about the Supreme Court that I was unaware of. I found the number of cases the justices of the court review to be staggering. The Supreme Court receives 100 new cases everyday! And each justice reviews about 130 cases each week. The justices review the legality of the rulings of the lower courts using older case precedents as well as going all the way back and examining the constitution directly. I learned that the Supreme Court works reactively and not proactively; meaning that the court reviews rulings that have already occurred seeking to improve it, and does not address possible issues in the future. All case rulings are released at the end of term and a justice of the majority is chosen to write an opinion on the case. If the decision is split other justices may choose to write their own opinions leading to a final opinion that can be upwards of 80 pages in length.

 

In my opinion there were several key points about the Supreme Court present in this video. One of which being that cases are tried in public consisting of an hour long oral argument between an attorney and all nine Supreme Court justices. Although it is described as an argument it more closely resembles a dialogue where the nine justices ask the attorney questions in order to show the other justices particular aspects of the case that could cause them to take the same position. Another key take away about the Supreme Court is that they receive so many cases that it is impossible for them to hear them all, and thanks to the Writ Of Certiorari they don’t have too. The court can’t hear all the cases; just because a case proposal is denied, it doesn’t mean the court is ruling against it.

 

One of the most interesting things I learned from watching this Supreme Court video was the fact that all the justices shake hands every time they meet. Regardless of their differences in the way they interpret the constitution, or their political affiliation, they shake hands as a sign of respect. Which is important because an appointment to the Supreme Court is a lifetime appointment, so they will be seeing each other a lot over the years.

 

After watching the video about the Supreme Court I began to realize just how powerful the Supreme Court is and just how influential the justices are. Through the process of judicial review, established by Chief Justice John Marshall in 1803, the Supreme Court checks the power of both the executive and legislative branches of government. And due to their heavy reliance on precedents, the decisions made by the current justices could determine the outcome of cases hundreds of years in the future.