General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Thom Hartmann spanked a couple of DU'ers today on his show - [View all]Zorra
(27,670 posts)But hasn't spanked them
Although all the argument was much ado about nothing, because Thom was correct in stating that the constitution does not specifically give the SCOTUS the power of judicial review,
I believe that Thom is deliberately making an issue out of this subject in order to wake people up to the fact that the SCOTUS is indeed our absolute ruler and we need to fix this ASAP.
The crux of the argument here is four-fold:
(1) Thom said that it was clearly not the founders intention that an unelected body, the SCOTUS, should have the power to overturn laws made by Congress.
(2) Thom said that there is no place in the Constitution where it states that laws made by Congress and signed by the President can be overturned by the Supreme Court.
(3) DU posters were erroneously saying that the Constitution, specifically the Third Amendment of the Constitution does give SCOTUS the power to overturn laws made by Congress.
(4) "The Constitution does not specifically give the federal judiciary the power of judicial review."
http://www.enotes.com/judicial-branch-reference/legislative-judicial-checks-balances
So, yeah, this argument of itself is bogus, it is much ado about nothing.
But:
It was the SCOTUS itself that decided it had the authority to overturn laws made by Congress in the Marbury vs. Madison case in 1803, effectively giving itself more power than Congress or the President combined.
The members of the SCOTUS are, essentially, our sovereign, appointed rulers for the duration of their lives, unless they choose to retire. Our kings and queens.
They even have the power to appoint Presidents, as we witnessed in Bush vs. Gore.
They even have the power to overturn laws made by Congress in order to assure 1% control of the electoral system, as we witnessed in the Citizen's United vs FEC.
The anti-Federalist Robert Yates said it very succinctly - I think he said this during the Constitutional Convention:
"The supreme court then have a right, independent of the legislature, to give a construction to the constitution and every part of it, and there is no power provided in this system to correct their construction or do it away. If, therefore, the legislature pass any laws, inconsistent with the sense the judges put upon the constitution, they will declare it void."