Describe the manner in which presiding judges use the principle of judicial self

Question

Describe the manner in which presiding judges use the principle of judicial self-restraint within their U.S. courtroom procedures. Provide two (2) examples where judicial self-restraint is in use to support your rationale.

Take a position as to the degree of success U.S. judges achieve in implementing the principle of judicial self-restraint in their courts (state, federal, or both). Support for your position should include a discussion of two (2) popular recent cases that were heard in either your home state or in a federal court.

Explanation / Answer

Ans a) Judicial Self Restraint- Judicial restraint is a theory of judicial interpretation—a theory of how judges interpret laws. Like most abstract theories, definitions vary slightly according to different sources..

Judges are said to exercise judicial restraint if they are hesitant to strike down laws that are not obviously unconstitutional. It is considered the opposite of judicial activism (also referred to as "legislating from the bench"). In deciding questions of constitutional law, judicially restrained jurists believe that it is important to defer to legislative intent, stare decisis, the Plain Meaning Rule, and a generally strict and textualist view of judicial interpretation.

There are two techniques of Judicial Self Restraint, The two techniques are procedural and substantive, where procedural is the refusal of jurisdiction in the courts. Substantive is the search for loopholes that the court will try to find and by this self-restrain the court will precedent it and win.

In the US supreme court it is being sued very often, it can be described with below examples.

The Supreme Court has been able to act in such a broad ranging policy making manor because of two major reasons: Article III and Judicial Review.
a. Article III of the Constitution is very broad and unlike Articles I and II, Article III didn’t provide a detailed set of powers the judiciary had to abide by. As a result Judicial Review and acts by congress led to the very broad policy making powers of the judiciary.
b. Judicial Review, as a result of Marbury V. Madison, has also given the judiciary broad ranging policy making powers. Marbury established the Supreme Court’s power to intervene in the whole separation of powers and checks and balances system established by the constitution. As a result the Supreme Court could rule however it pleased in any case.

QuestionB) Take a position as to the degree of success U.S. judges achieve in implementing the principle of judicial self-restraint in their courts (state, federal, or both). Support for your position should include a discussion of two (2) popular recent cases that were heard in either your home state or in a federal court.

Ans B) It can explained with the below cases..

It is sometimes required to establish correct justice and fullfill wishes of the masses, often laws are not clear then i that cases judged have to use their own wisdom to do natural justice. Judicial self restraint is that thing which judges excercise to follow the principle of natural justice and to do best soultuon for any complicated condition.

Case 1 Dred Scott v. Sandford, 60 U.S. 393 (1857), was a landmark decision by the U.S. Supreme Court in which the Court held that "a negro, whose ancestors were imported into [the U.S.], and sold as slaves”, whether enslaved or free, could not be an American citizen and therefore had no standing to sue in federal court, and that the federal government had no power to regulate slavery in the federal territories acquired after the creation of the United States. Dred Scott, an enslaved man of "the negro African race"who had been taken by his owners to free states and territories, attempted to sue for his freedom. In a 7–2 decision written by Chief Justice Roger B. Taney, the court denied Scott's request. The decision was only the second time that the Supreme Court had ruled an Act of Congress to be unconstitutional

Although Taney hoped that his ruling would finally settle the slavery question, the decision immediately spurred vehement dissent from anti-slavery elements in the North, especially Republicans. Many contemporary lawyers, and most modern legal scholars, consider the ruling regarding slavery in the territories to be dictum, not binding precedent. The decision proved to be an indirect catalyst for the American Civil War. It was functionally superseded by the Civil Rights Act of 1866 and by the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which gave African Americans full citizenship.

The Supreme Court's decision in Dred Scott v. Sandford is unanimously denounced by scholars. Bernard Schwartz says it "stands first in any list of the worst Supreme Court decisions—Chief Justice C.E. Hughes called it the Court's greatest self-inflicted wound".[8]Junius P. Rodriguez says it is "universally condemned as the U.S. Supreme Court's worst decision".[9] Konig et al. say it was "unquestionably, our court's worst decision ever".

Case 2 - Luther v. Borden, 48 U.S. 1 (1849), was a case in which the Supreme Court of the United States established the question doctrine in controversies arising under the Guarantee Clause of Article Four of the United States Constitution (Art. IV, § 4).

Martin Luther was part of the Dorr Rebellion, an attempt to overthrow the charter government of Rhode Island that had stymied the efforts of those who wished to broaden the voting rights of state residents. The rebellion began as a political effort but turned violent. Martin Luther was arrested by Luther M. Borden, a state official, who searched his home and allegedly damaged his property. Luther contended that the charter government was not "republican" in nature because it restricted the electorate to only the most propertied classes; because Article Four states that "the United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government," Luther argued that the Supreme Court should find that Borden acted without proper authority. In doing so, the Court would necessarily find that the "Dorrite" alternative republican government was the lawful government of Rhode Island, superseding the charter government.

The Court's Decision

The Supreme Court found that it was up to the President and Congress to enforce this clause and that, as an inherently political question, it was outside the purview of the Court.

The ruling established that the "republican form of government" clause of Article Four was non-justiciable, a ruling that still holds today. However, two decades after Luther v. Borden was decided, the Fourteenth Amendment, which included the Equal Protection Clause, was added to the Constitution. Baker v. Carr, in which the Court found that the Court could examine Tennessee’s apportionment of legislative districts, was based on the Equal Protection Clause, and many subsequent cases that covered much of the same ground as Luther v. Borden followed suit.

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