What is judicial activism?

Question

What is judicial activism?

A. The practice in the judiciary of closely adhering to the letter of the Constitution

B. When a court changes the interpretation of a law from what the legislative branch intended

C. The exercise routine preferred by Supreme Court justices

D. The practice in the judiciary of offering rulings that are often conservative in nature

Answer 1

Given your four answers, B is the most correct.

Black's Law Dictionary defines judicial activism as "a philosophy of judicial decision-making whereby judges allow their personal views about public policy, among other factors, to guide their decisions, usu. with the suggestion that adherents of this philosophy tend to find constitutional violations and are willing to ignore precedent."

David Strauss of the University of Chicago Law School has also argued that judicial activism can be narrowly defined as one or more of three possible things:

    * overturning laws as unconstitutional

    * overturning judicial precedent

    * ruling against a preferred interpretation of the constitution

With these definitions, answer A is not correct because the "letter" of the Constitution is often interpreted with a particular viewpoint in mind, and there are several court cases where a literal meaning of the Constitution has been rejected in favor of a broader view.

Answer B is the most correct, because the legislative branch creates laws, which the judiciary interprets. Since the court will likely find "violations" under the Black's definition, those violations can only come from the laws produced by the legislation, meaning the court will change what the legislative branch intended because of this violation.

Answer C is humorous, but clearly incorrect.

Answer D should be read with "conservative" as being "resistant to change". Since Black's defines judicial activism as being willing to ignore precedent, or previous decisions, this means that judges are willing to change. This is not the meaning of conservative, so this answer is not correct.

Answer B is the most correct answer.

Answer 2

E. conservative myth.

Answer 3

B

Answer 4

Judicial activism is a term used in the United States that is open to some controversy concerning its true meaning. Its meaning before the 1990s was taken to be a pejorative term for misuse of judicial power for the purpose of obtaining a predetermined judgement based on the political convictions of the judges without regard to the U.S. constitution, written law or legal precedent. After the year 2000 it was adopted by members of the opposition party to mean the appointment of judges for the purpose of political expediency.

Answer 5

One might hope it would be A, but recently it has been closer to D.

Answer 6

E. What somebody whines about when they don't get what they want in a court decision in which the judge has accurately interpreted the law.

Answer 7

B!

Black's Law Dictionary defines judicial activism as "a philosophy of judicial decision-making whereby judges allow their personal views about public policy, among other factors, to guide their decisions, usually with the suggestion that adherents of this philosophy tend to find constitutional violations and are willing to ignore precedent."

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\\  Golgothor

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Answer 8

B.