Oct 27, 2006: Lab

Announcements

You can see your midterm in the Review Room next week 
(Oct 30 - Nov 3) ONLY!!!
-Bring your student ID
-No reviews Next Week!

There was discussion about the course code at the 
coursecompass site: 
the code is pulsipher77171 
the site is http://www.coursecompass.com.

Also there was confusion about large states ratifying 
the constitution first or small states ratifying it first.

At the convention there was disagreement and in general 
the small states comprised first and then the large 
states compromised and then they all signed the constitution.  
BUT! Then in order to legitimize the new constitution, each 
representative had to go home to their state and have a vote
on whether to accept the constitution (to ratify the 
constitution).  You can see the order the states ratified the 
constitution in the lecture slides or here

Notes

Court System

Chisholm vs Georgia 1793
------------------------
-shows the weakness of the court system
-court system had only been operating 5 years under the new system
-it hadn't had a chance to do much yet
-basically between georgia and chisholm (a citizen of south carolina)
-supreme court has responsibility for any court case between a person and a state
-Alexander Chisolm is lawyer representing a client who has passed away
-Chisolm sues Georgia, georgia says we're sovereign, georgia decides not to show up

Chisolm wins, why?
-Georgia is NOT sovereign "as to the purposes of the union"
-The Supreme Court has jurisdiction over lawsuits between states and citizens of other states

Result
-Georgia doesn't want to pay
-Georgia house of representatives that passes a bill ordering DEATH by hanging for any federal officer who tried to enforce the supreme court ruling (that chisolm won)
-11th Amendment is passed (by the states)
--Supreme Court's jurisdiction does not extend to cases between states and citizens of other states
--the state felt like the supreme court was interfering in state affairs

Case significance-
-supreme court is weak
-states resist the courts power (immensely)

Supreme court wants to be stronger

At the time they had two political parties:
Federalists - Republicans

Marbury vs Madison 1803
-Jefferson (republican party) wins election in november, but does not become president until march
-Jefferson is going to be inaugurated in march (made president)
-John Adams (federalist party) is the president up until march
-from november to march (called the lame duck period)
-Adams wants to stack the judiciary with federalist judges
-midnight appointments (done at the last second)

-John Marshall (federalist party) is John Adams Secretary of State (required to deliver the paperwork to appoint these judges)
-John Marshall is appointed to the supreme court so he doesn't have time to deliver the paperwork
-Jefferson decides he isn't going to have James Madison (new secretary of state) deliver the appointments (appoint federalist judges)
-Marbury is supposed to receive an appointment (not over supreme court) over a small district court
-he wants to be a judge. so he sues James Madison for not delivering the papers to appoint him to be a judge
-He sues Madison under the Judiciary Act of 1789
--He wanted a writ of mandamus (a writing of command)

Marbury wants the Supreme Court to issue a writ of mandamus to force the executive branch (madison) to hand over the paperwork so Marbury can become a judge
-Marshall is head of the supreme court, madison says I don't need to do anything, and the court is weak
-if he rules in favor of marbury, (federalist party) madison says he is going to ignore the power of the court (this shows the court is weak)
-if he rules in favor of madison, it shows he is giving in, (showing the court is weak)

He ruled that the writ of mandamus was unconstitutional
-that the supreme court does not have the power to order around members of the executive
-but he rules that marbury deserves the appointment
-by ruling a law as unconstitutional he creates a tool (judicial review) for the courts
-the court ends up stronger

judicial review
-the power of the supreme court to strike down laws as unconstitutional or constitutional

this is a common essay question for exams
"Is judicial review in the constitution?"
No, It is precedent (tradition) that Marshall established from the Marbury vs Madison case