Judicial interpretation
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Judicial interpretation is a theory or mode of thought that explains how the judiciary should interpret the law, particularly constitutional documents and legislation (see statutory interpretation). An interpretation which results in or supports some form of law-making role for the judiciary in interpreting the law is sometimes pejoratively characterized as judicial activism, the opposite of which is judicial lethargy, with judicial restraint somewhere in between.
Contents |
[edit] Interpreting the Constitution of the United States
Throughout the history of the United States, courts have used a wide variety of theories of judicial interpretation to construe the Constitution of the United States, including textualism, originalism, strict constructionism, functionalism, doctrinalism, developmentalism, contextualism (historical or facial), structuralism, or even a combination of several of these schools of thought. For example, some jurists may interpret the Constitution based on their philosophical outlook that the Constitution is a "Living Constitution," or on the opposite extreme, that it is "The Moral Constitution".
[edit] The textualist or strict constructionist approach
The textualist approach to interpreting the Constitution, sometimes called strict constructionism, insists on the literal meaning of a provision in the face of contrary claims that the text must mean more or less than it expressly says. This approach appeals to the promises of simplicity and determinacy. For example, Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black insisted that the First Amendment's command that "Congress shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech" meant exactly that, "no law." Textualism's simplicity and determinacy, however, can also be liabilities. Textual provisions, read as units in isolation, can be rigid. Continuing with the above example, although Justice Black would have said that "no law" can be passed abridging the freedom of speech, he certainly would not sensibly have said that treason was protected speech, or that shouting "fire!" in a crowded theater was protected speech. A purely textualist approach, then, can leave questions about what the text at issue actually means.
[edit] The originalist approach
The originalist approach aspires to interpret constitutional text in light of original intentions or understandings of the founding fathers who wrote the Constitution. Advocates of originalism, such as Justice Antonin Scalia, are centrally concerned with discovering the subjective intentions of the figures who wrote or framed particular constitutional provisions. They tend to focus on the original public meaning or understanding of a constitutional provision for the generation that ratified or amended that provision. Originalism, however, also has several liabilities, including determining what counts as evidence of intent, whose intent counts, and whether the promulgatd intent should be abstract or concrete. Accordingly, one common cricitism of originalism is that an originalist, while claiming to interpret a provision based on the original intent behind it, actually will pick and choose from a variety of sources to meet the meaning he or she wishes to give it.
[edit] The doctrinalist approach
The doctrinalist approach searches out past interpretations of the Constitution as they relate to specific problems and tries to organize them into a coherent whole, fitting the solution of the current problem at issue into that whole. Doctrinalism gives a central place to the principle of stare decisis, seeking to extend received decisions and understandings in incremental fashion to cover new cases and problems as they arise. In doing so, it attempts to preserve the continuity of the common law even if effecting change. This method is often used to teach constitutional law in American law schools, where casebooks often are organized topically. Doctrinalism, however, has its own difficulties; textualists argue that dotrinalism distracts attention from the Constitution, itself, lending too much status to commentary on the text. For example, Justice Felix Frankfurter wrote, "the ulimate touchstone of constitutionality is the Constitution itself and now what we have said about it." Another criticism, levied by jurists like Antonin Scalia, is that doctrinalism allows for too much judicial discretion.
[edit] The developmentalist approach
The developmentalist approach builds on doctrinalism by accepting the value of incremental additions of judge-made doctrine, but goes further by enlarging the interpretive arena to include broader historical events, such asinformal practices, usages, and political culture. Developmentalists reject the notion of a static constitution or "The Moral Constitution", and instead tend to focus on "how meaning has evolved." Chief Justice Earl Warren exemplified this when he said the Constitution ought to be interpreted in light of "the evolving standards of decency that mark the progress of a maturing society." Accordingly, proponents of developmentalism often argue the theory of the Living Constitution, which premises that the Constitution is, to some degree, dynamic. Because of this, however, developmentalism shares many of the same problems as doctrinalism. For example, it does little to advance any goal of stability, for by its very nature it commits itself to the legitimacy of what it calls "constitutional chagne" not merely from the past to the present but also from the present to an unknown future. As such, a common criticism is that it makes the Constitution "mean nothing," because it holds that it can mean "anything."
[edit] The contextualist approach
Like originalism and textualism, the contextualist approach is concerned with an original meaning of the text itself to those who wrote the text, but instead of a subjective intent, it seeks to examine the broad context in which the provision at issue was promulgated, arguing that, in some important respect, the provision can only be understood relative to its context. This context can be facial - that is, examining why the provision is located where it is in the whole document, or it can be historical - examining the broad and long history behind the provision to determine the broadest possible intent. This was the main theory of interpretation that the Supreme Court used in the 1880s through the 1920s, resuling in such decisions as Plessy v. Ferguson (upholding racial segregation because the broad historical context of the Thirteenth Amendment and Fourteenth Amendment did not support the idea that they were intended to prevent states from separating races), Lochner v. New York (striking down minimum wage laws because they violated the Fourteenth Amendment's contextual "general right to make a contract in relation to his business"), and Bailey v. Drexel Furniture Co. (striking down a tax on child labor because the context of Article I of the Constitution was such that the framers intended taxes not to function as regulations).
For example, one main proponent of historical contextualism, Chief Justice William Howard Taft, used the broad historical context of the Fourth Amendment to determine in Olmstead v. United States that wiretapping was not subject to the Fourth Amendment's warrant restrictions because it was not a "physical" intrusion. Notably, however, this same instance shows some of the drawbacks of contextualism: in Katz v. United States, a developmentalist outlook, using evolving standards of decency, determined that the Fourth Amendment ought to protect people and not just physical places, and so wiretapping should be subject to the Fourth Amendment's warrant restrictions, too. Opponents of historical contextualism, then, often argue that a purely contextualist outlook prohibits the Constituion from adapting to different cultural, technological, and social developments.
[edit] The structuralist approach
The structuralist approach proposes to decide hard cases by looking for guidance in the Constitution's general arrangement of offices and powers. In so doing, it is related to facial contextualism. That general arrangement might be characterized as a form of democracy or representative, deliberative, or constitutionalist government. This approach differs from textualism or strict constructionism because it notes that none of the Constitution's principal structural ideas, such as separation of powers, checks and balances, federalism, democracy, or fundamental rights, is expressly mentioned in the text. Proponents of structuralism explain and justify their decisions by advancing claims about the proper understanding of constitutional structure. Chief Justice Salmon P. Chase advanced such claims when examining in Texas v. White what deference ought to be given to decisions of Confederate states' courts once the American Civil War was over. Chief Justice John Marshall also advanced a structuralist outlook when discussing his conception of federal-state relations in McCulloch v. Maryland. Still, structuralism lends itself to opposition which argues that it is too subjective, without any formal basis for making its claims because it lacks textual, contextual, or historical support.
