The Judicial Branch Flashcards
Established Judicial Review.
Everything ties back to this- the courts have the power to interpret the laws.
Elements of Standing
- injury- imminent harm, personal
- causation- injury must be fairly traceable to the defendants conduct.
- redressability- questions whether the court can provide relief
Allen v. Right
- about the standing requirement
- Rule of law: To have standing to bring a lawsuit, plaintiffs musts sufficiently allege that they have personally suffered a distinct injury =, and the chain of causation linking that injury to the action of the defendant must not be weakened.
- here, parents couldn’t bring forth claims on behalf of their children.
Lujan
- girlies want to visit the animals
- NO GENERALIZED GRIEVANCES
this means no way Jose if it affects it can potentially hurt all citizens.
Massachusetts v. EPA (our partial court)
-Facts: regulation of new car emissions.
- Rule of law: We need an actual case or controversy- P must demonstrate a CONCRETE injury that is ACTUAL or IMMINENT and must be “fairly traceable to D” and there has to be an opportunity for redress.
- Rationale: they met the standing requirement because the injury to the Massachusetts shoreline was imminent.
- DISSENT: Roberts, Alito, Thomas and Scalia
- Roberts notes that these shoreline issues will be felt by citizens as a whole and is not an individual injury.
- Scalia does not believe in global warming.
Laufer- disability hotel case.
Woman does not get to sue hotels for their lack of disability accommodations when she hasn’t even stayed at the hotel.
What cases the court won’t here
POLITICAL QUESTIONS! NONE OF THAT!!!
- Gerrymandering and malapportionment- no questions under the guarantee clause.
Political Question- Baker v, Carr
Rule: A challenge to malapportionment of state legislature under equal protection is NOT a political question, this is justiciable because it deals with the rights of people.
Baker Test- Political Question involves
- A history of commitment from another branch (its another branch’s job)
- a lack of judicially manageable standards for resolving
- the impossibility of a court’s deciding the issue w/out an. initial policy determination of a kind clearly for non-judicial discretion.
- the impossibility of a court’s undertaking independent resolution without expressing a lack of respect to other branches of government
- An unusual need for adherence to a political decision already made r
- the potential for embarrassment from various pronouncements.
Rucho v. Common Cause (2019)
partisan gerrymandering case
Rule of law: Partisan gerrymandering is a nonjusticiable political question.
facts: maps were being drawn unfairly, making things unfair to both political parties.
rationale: partisan gerrymandering has existed for a long time, if the framers wanted to do something about it they would have written it into the constitution.
- they acknowledge that it would have been a different question if it involved race.
DISSENT in Rucho
Sotomayor, Kagan, RBG, and Breyer
- THE RIGHT TO PARTICIPATE IN AN ELECTION IS A FUNDAMENTAL RIGHT. The courts need to intervene when this is at stake.
Prof’s test when it came to rucho
just know that Kagan and Sotomayor talked about how the majority was stressing that the court was not experts and had no way of knowing anything about the maps and gerrymandering, however the girlies were like WE HAVE TECHNOLOGY TO GUIDE US.
Zivotofsky (2012)
the constitution grants courts, not the political branches, the authority to determine the constitutionality of statutes.
- state made a law that people had to list their place of birth as Jerusalem.
- the court still heard and states that congress may not require the state dept to indicate in passports that Jerusalem is part of Israel
MAJORITY IN ZIVOTOFSKY
Roberts, Scalia, Thomas, Alito, Sotomayor Kagan, RBG
Everyone but Breyer
