Judicial Review Essay

“We all learn in school that the judicial, legislative and executive branches of government must check and balance each other. But other non state institutions must participate in this important system of checks and balances as well,” stated by Alan Dershowitz. All of the branches should be checked on power by everyone. That is where Judicial review comes in, it is a check and balance on the Executive branch and the Legislative branch. Judicial review is an important part of our constitutional system, it has been apart of our government for more than 200 years. The power of the Supreme Court, judicial review, or the ability of the Court to declare a Legislative or Executive act in violation of the Constitution. The Court established this doctrine in the case of Marbury v. Madison of 1803.
One way is that they try to figure out the plain meaning of the words used in the Constitution, they decide what the words had meant at the time they were written. Another way they interpret the Constitution is by using the intentions of the Framers. Justices should base their interpretations on what the Framers would have decided. The justices also decide if the law is based on some fundamental principles of government. Interpretations should be based on principles such as natural rights, republican government, and constitutional government. The last way Framers interpret the Constitution is by looking at today’s social values and needs. They have to take into account that life is not the same as it was when the Constitution was made. A judge this year found that it was unconstitutional for the government to have domestic phone records without any disclosure of content by saying this violates our privacy rights and can be used against us, such as the Snowden case. With this case, the judges had to interpret the Constitution to today’s circumstances on determining if it was constitutional or not, which it was