Judicial activism

In this report for a non-governmental organization, Mclemore uses personal stories and examples from the USA to portray mandatory minimum sentencing as a lousy policy that should not be enacted in Canada. Mclemore highlights the negative aspects of such a policy that would take Canada in the wrong direction with its policy on crime. Her examples of these ‘tough on crime’ policies failing in the USA are especially convincing as it sheds light on the practice contributing negatively in past…

The Supreme Court, under Article 3 of the constitution, only had original jurisdiction over certain cases. It was after the prominent Marbury vs Madison case that they gave themselves the power of Judicial Review (Judicial Process, Page 415). Judicial Review is the power granted by the Supreme Court itself to review and overturn any acts of Congress, and to declare laws unconstitutional. This gives the Supreme Court a certain degree of power over states and Congress and also gives them the…

In the book Mighty Judgement, Philip Slayton talks about the Supreme Court of Canada as a government institution which needs reform on the premises that Supreme Court of Canada is powerful, paternalistic, competent, undemocratic, and secretive. Slayton begins with the question of whether judges make or interpret the law and whether they should be doing only one of those things. Also, he describes the historical past of the Supreme Court, and how the 1982 Charter of Rights and Freedoms affected…

more power than another. In our government, there is a hierarchy of power. Congress, the legislative branch, is the most powerful of the three, the president, executive branch, is next in the order of most powerful, finished by the Supreme Court, judicial branch. Their powers each lie in different areas and there is a great separation of power as the framers intended, however, there are some aspects in which these branches overlap and that is where the different amounts of power can be observed.…

U.S. Supreme Court Institutional Legitimacy It is rumored that in reaction to a ruling from the Supreme Court in 1832, President Andrew Jackson stated, “John Marshall has made his decision, now let him enforce it!” This quote highlights a problem with the Supreme Court in which it can neither create nor enforce legislation. Because it has ”no influence over either the sword or the purse,” the Court must rely on its institutional legitimacy to ensure its rulings are respected (Hamilton 1788).…

Although the power of judicial review is not explicitly mentioned in the Constitution, the Supreme Court had acquired it through landmark cases and the founding fathers original intent. The landmark case that gave them the power of judicial review is the case Marbury v. Madison. In this case, President John Adams appointed William Marbury to be a justice of the peace along with forty-one others days before his presidency expired. The commissions were not sent out before the end of his presidency…

Marbury vs. Madison was one of the most defining cases for the Supreme Court because it introduced judicial review. There was a race for presidency, and as John Adams term was ending he passed the Judicial Act of 1801. This law let Adams appoint other federalists as an attempt of control over the federal judiciary system. Although it was signed and stamped, it was never delivered once President Thomas Jefferson took control of the office. Commissions were never sent out as commanded by Thomas…

First, mandatory minimums limit judicial discretion and constitute too general a punishment for similar offenses without consideration of the different circumstances surrounding each case. Evan Bernick, Assistant Director of the Center for Judicial Engagement at the Institute for Justice and former Visiting Legal Fellow at the Heritage Foundation, and Paul Larkin, Senior Legal Research Fellow…

The High Courts in Calcutta, Madras and Bombay were the most important. Appeals could lie from these three courts to the Judicial Committee of Privy Council in England. The first important inference to a Supreme Court was made in the Nehru Report. It recommended that this hierarchy of the courts shall be kept, but there should be an apex court, i.e., Supreme Court, with original…

Commerce law assessment task 3- Lachlan O’Malley Mandatory Sentencing in New South Wales 1. Mandatory Sentencing- a mandatory sentence is a court decision where legal discretion is limited by law. Most frequently, people convicted of certain crimes such as armed robbery or murder must be punished with at least a minimum number of years set in prison. 2. The introduction of the mandatory sentencing in NSW was the outcome of several brutal crimes. The act is projected to measure alcohol and…