Cooper V. Aaron (1958): Judicial Review, Interpret Constitution

• After Brown, a major confrontation occurred in Arkansas, where Gov. Faubus defied three court orders to integrate Little Rock Central H.S. President Eisenhower sent in troops to prevent the obstruction of justice. The Supreme Court held a special session to affirm the decisions of the lower courts

• Majority: WARREN: The court said that Marbury “declared the basic principal that the federal judiciary is supreme in the exposition of the law of the Constitution.” This claim exaggerates and distorts the opinion of Marshall.

Swann V. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Bd. Ed. (1971): 14th Amendment, Segregation

• By 1971 there had been little progress in desegregating public schools, despite Brown. School boards were under pressure by courts to produce their plans. The court focuses on remedies available to federal courts to produce a unitary school system free of state-imposed segregation.

• Majority: BURGER: A unanimous court held that district courts have broad power to fashion remedies for desegregated schools. To achieve greater racial balance, judges could alter school district zones, reassign teachers, or bus students. The Court also struck down state anti-bussing laws.

• Theses rulings appeared to clash with language in Civil Rights Act of 1964, which defined desegregation as the assignment of students to public schools without regard to their race, color, religion, or national origin, and stated that desegregation “shall not mean the assignment of students to public schools in order to overcome racial imbalance. In fact, race was regularly taken into account by courts to devise desegregation plans. The act also did not empower federal officials or courts “to issue any order seeking to achieve a racial balance in any school by requiring the transportation of pupils” The court finessed this potential conflict by arguing that the busing provision was directed at DE FACTO, not DE JURE segregation.

Freeman V. Pitts (1992): 14th Amendment, School Desegregation

• The trend towards accepting schools that are largely all white or all black was furthered. Massive bussing was not considered an option

• Majority: KENNEDY: Federal courts have the authority to relinquish supervision and control of school districts even if full compliance with desegregation plans has not been achieved in every area of school operations. A school district has a duty to eliminate DE JURE segregation, not de facto. It held that when a racial imbalance is the result of population shifts, school districts and judges are not required to adopt “awkward, inconvenient, and even bizarre” measures (language taken from Swann) to achieve integrated schools.

• Concurring: SOUTER, BLACKMUN, STEVENS, O’CONNER: concur only with judgement, b/c court paid insufficient attention to Swann and the connection between schools and housing.

Martin V. Hunter’s Lessee (1816): Supremacy Clause, Judicial Review

• A state district court upheld Martin’s land claim, which was based on a treaty between America and Great Britain. The Virginia Court of Appeals regarded the issue as solely a STATE ISSUE, and reversed the district court. The Supreme Court set aside the state ruling, and the state court refused to obey. The Virginia court claimed that the Supreme Court had no authority to review its judgement, and that Section 25 of Judiciary Act of 1789, which gave Supreme Court appellate jurisdiction over state courts, was unconstitutional.

• Majority: STORY: An ardent defender of national interests, Story established the power of S. Court to review state courts. There is nothing in constitution which restrains or limits power of congress to establish courts under every variety of form of appellate or original jurisdiction.