Limitations on the Supreme court?

Question

What limitations are there on the powers of the supreme court?

Answer 1

Well, there are a number of checks and balances--

They can be impeached if they are no longer "in good behavior" (debate as to what that means... probably DOES NOT mean that they issue bad rulings).

There is no limit to the number of justices on the Court in the Constitution -- so technically the legislature could pass a law to increase the size of the Court and get more justices that would vote their way (FDR proposed this during the dpression but didn't have to use it because a few justices died)

They are appointed by the executive, and really, each president usually gets 1-3 appointments when they're in office.

They can only accept cases that are properly appealed to them and over which they have jurisdiction (they can't interpret issues solely of state law for example)

They can only adjudicate cases where there's a real "case or controversy" between two or more parties... so they can't "imagine" a case and make a ruling on it.

But the biggest limitation, really, is that they have no way to enforce their rulings... they rely on the agents of the executive to do so.  If tomorrow the Supreme Court said not only that Guantanamo prisoners had rights to challenge their detention, but that every Guantanamo prisoner must be immediately set free and be given a $1,000,000 house as reparations for being held captive, regardless of whether they've admitted they're terrorists or not, the president could simply say "No."  The Court could scream and holler all it wanted, but other than the few court security officers employed by the Supreme Court, it has no way to affect its will on an unwilling executive.  Of course, the rule of law would completely disentegrate and we'd lose the best part of our democracy, but the president could simply say "no."

Because that is always there, the Supreme Court is NOT going to write those crazy orders, because they know they would ultimately not be enforced.  That acts as a limitation on their power, too... to have their orders enforced, they have to be at least in the ballpark.

Answer 2

they can only review cases that come before them from the lower courts...they cannot solicit cases

Answer 3

The checks and balances system in the Constitution.

The Exective Branch appoints the Justices, but the Senate may reject the appointment. The Senate may also impeach A Surpreme Court Justice if the need arises.