Constitution Question/Debate

Article 3 of the constitution states:

In all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, and those in which a State shall be Party, the supreme Court shall have original Jurisdiction. In all the other Cases before mentioned, the supreme Court shall have appellate Jurisdiction, both as to Law and Fact, with such Exceptions, and under such Regulations as the Congress shall make

Does the clause in bold really mean that congress has the power to remove the courts ability to hear certain kinds of cases just by ordinary statute?

In Durousseau V United States the court declared that the court got its power to hear cases on appeal from the judiciary act even though it is written in the constitution that it has appellate jurisdiction for all cases arising under the constitution. This was later confirmed in Ex Parte McCardle that held that the congress can withdraw appelate jurisdiction from the court at any time.

This seems like an incredible loophole that would allow congress to effectivly remove the power of all federal courts. The constitution only establishes the Supreme Court and leaves creating the federal courts up to cngress. Congress could effectivly eliminate all federal courts (as long as they don't deminish judges pay) and then declare that the supreme court cannot hear any cases. Or they could just add at the end of every bill "hence forth the supreme court shall not be allowed to hear appeals regarding this legislation."

It seems like one hell of a loophole.

Holy technical question, batman!

I have no idea what the actual law is on the subject.  I'll ask next time I see somebody who does.

But, in the meantime, I will speculate and observe.

The real answer, of course, is "no".  It doesn't matter what the words on the page say.  Just like the looniebins suing the IRS on grounds that the income tax is unconstitutional, any claim that Congress could casually legislate the Court out of business would be declared invalid, just because.  You may have a fine technical argument, but you would simply not be allowed to completely overturn our governmental structure on a technicality.

The Constitution would be read to mean what it needed to mean to maintain the status quo, more or less.  And who do you think is in charge of interpreting the constitution, hmm?  Notice how the Court bent and twisted the second amendment to basically arrive at "current practice is ok" in the DC case.  The Court rarely does anything that leads to major upheaval, and certainly would not rule anything this massive.

On a more substantive level, I think you are reading it wrong.  I read that sentence to mean that Congress has the ability to rearrange whether the Court has original or appellate jurisdiction.  The question of whether there is Federal jurisdiction at all is mentioned elsewhere, and not subject to this qualifier.

Hm, I remember a teacher of mine bringing that up once. I remember him stating that if Congress wanted to, they could ban the Supreme Court from hearing cases related to gay marriage.

I'm reading it as that Congress can limit the Supreme Court's power to hear cases. But, I don't think any Congress would be that stupid to think it can limit the Supreme Court and get away with it.

The only official way to find out how it is interpreted, is to bring it to the Supreme Court.


Edited by cdacda13 - 24 September 2008 at 1:46pm

Article one: I did not know that. Congress is seriously trying to cover their asses with that one. I'm surprised the media isn't hopping on that on. (O wait, liberal media plus liberal Congress= Positive Press) /conspiracy theory.

Article two: While its sorta, kinda, limiting the cases the Supreme Court can hear, its not limiting any cases that deal with Constitutional issues.
(Ok, I reached a little on that one, forgive me.)