Supreme Court Case Study

Where the Constitution provides foundation for the importance of judicial independence and the publications of the era provide context and analytical guidance, cases before the High Court have since then expounded upon the importance of judicial independence by discussing it in contexts beyond that of life tenure or compensation. Bradley v. Fisher allowed the Court to discuss judicial independence in the context of judicial immunity, stating that judges being free to act upon their own convictions without apprehension of consequences to themselves is "a general principle of the highest importance to the proper administration of justice. . ." Although the context is one regarding the immunity of judges against liability, the message is merely

It is of great ease for those opposed to posit that the federal judiciary usurps the power of the executive if it sets precedent that narrows the authority that the Constitution grants the executive, but it is far more difficult for those opposed to accept the reality that the federal courts operate not to remove power from the executive, but rather to prevent it from infringing upon the rights of the people. For example, at present, various United States District Courts and Circuit Courts of Appeal have ruled upon the executive actions of the current presidential administration of Donald J. Trump with regard to immigration policies, with the Supreme Court following by granting writ of certiorari as well. Executive Order 13769, signed by President Donald J. Trump and infamously referred to as the “travel ban,” saw actions brought against it in federal courts in nearly fifty different times and on behalf of various parties, many of them states. The United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit issued a temporary restraining order on the executive action. The United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia ruled in another instance that the executive action violated the Establishment Clause of the Constitution,

In the instance of the former, assuming either the presence of elected judicial processes or the presence of term-limits, those judges interpreting the law in a manner that ultimately conflicts with the executive orders of President Trump (or any sitting president at any given time in history, for that matter) would, ad minimum, risk upsetting a majority of the voting population that they, themselves, would have to face in the instance of re-election for their current offices, election for higher judicial offices, or election in non-judicial offices of political influence in their post-judicial careers. In the instance of the latter, even assuming term-limitations in absentia an election-oriented judiciary, these judges could potentially face equal difficulties in the realities of a world where personal political opinions may very well inhibit their employability or quality of life upon their departure from the