Judicial Philosophy

2.11: Checks on the Judicial Branch

What concept applies to the message of this cartoon?

Judicial Philosophy

Judicial Activism, Judicial Restraint, Loose Construction, and Strict Construction

Multiple Choice

In Texas v. Johnson (1989) Justice Brennan found that Johnson's conviction for flag desecration is inconsistent with the first amendment. “The first amendment forbids the abridgment only of 'speech' but we have long recognized that its protection does not end at the spoken word.” The decision overturned a Texas state law banning the desecration of the American flag.

• Judicial Activism

• Judicial Restraint

Multiple Choice

Chief Justice Taney in the Dred Scott decision declared, "persons of color. . . were not included in the word citizens and they are described as a different class of persons" and could NOT sue in federal court based on Article IV Section 2.

• Judicial Activism

• Judicial Restraint

Multiple Choice

Justice Harry Blackmun in dissenting opinion in Furman v. Georgia (1972) (voided the death penalty) stated, "Cases such as these provide for me an excruciating agony of the spirit I yield to no one in the depth of my distaste antipathy and indeed abhorrence, for the death penalty. Were I a legislator I would vote against the death penalty. . I do not sit, however as a legislator... our task here .. . is to vote pass on constitutionality of legislation that has been enacted and that is challenged. This is the sole task for judges. We should not allow our personal preferences as to the wisdom of legislative or congressional action, or our distaste for such action to guide our judicial decision.”

• Judicial Activism

• Judicial Restraint

Multiple Choice

In Texas v. Johnson (1989) Justice Brennan found that Johnson's conviction for flag desecration is inconsistent with the first amendment. “The first amendment forbids the abridgment only of 'speech' but we have long recognized that its protection does not end at the spoken word.” The decision overturned a Texas state law banning the desecration of the American flag.

• Strict Construction

• Loose Construction

Multiple Choice

In Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, the Supreme Court ruled, 5-4, that the government cannot restrict the spending of corporations for political campaigns, maintaining that it's their First Amendment right to support candidates as they choose.

• Strict Construction

• Loose Construction

Multiple Choice

Daniel Webster, Federalist from New Hampshire, in a speech on a conscription bill, to the House of Representatives, 9 December 1814

The [Madison] administration asserts the right to fill the ranks of the regular army by compulsion. . . . Where is it written in the Constitution, in what article or section is it contained, that you may take children from their parents, and parents from their children, and compel them to fight the battles of any war in which the folly or the wickedness of the government may engage it? . . . Who will show me any constitutional injunction which makes it the duty of the American people to surrender everything valuable in life, and even life itself, . . . whenever the purposes of an ambitious and mischievous government may require it?. . . If the secretary of war has proved the right of Congress to enact a law enforcing a draft of men out of the militia into the regular army, he will at any time be able to prove quite as clearly that Congress has power to create a dictator.

• Strict Construction

• Loose Construction