The United States Supreme Court is a very powerful part of our government often ruling on controversial and undecided issues that create precedent for the future, because of its power and recent political events checks and balances are more important than ever and this especially includes the relationship between congress and the USSC. While the court is undeniably a very powerful force in The United States with the ability to use judicial review or statutory review in many cases as well as the raw power of the supreme court in ruling on topics that can have lasting effects on the legal landscape indefinitely through the use of precedent it is still just like the rest of The United States government designed to have its power checked such as through the methods discussed above. At the same time just because congress has the ability to check the courts doesn’t undermine the power of the court and does not mean that the checks will be used often or effectively; due to the intentionally difficult process of obtaining a constitutional amendment congress is left with the ability to use statutes and while these are useful they can be overturned in the future making some of them only a temporary fix as power changes hands very often in the legislature. When it comes to congress overturning USSC rulings there are two main routes they can take, a federal statute or a constitutional amendment.
When congress chooses to go against a decision of the USSC and want to ensure that the court cannot change the action at a later date they go with a constitution amendment. The reason that this is not used as often as a federal statute is because it is much harder to obtain requiring two thirds of both the senate and house of representatives and in todays political climate this has grown even more challenging. One example of congress using a constitutional amendment to overturn a court ruling is in the case of “Minor v. Happersett” in which the USSC ruled that “the Constitution of the United States does not confer the right of suffrage upon anyone” (Waite 1875). Congress had the support to overturn this with a constitutional amendment because the unpopularity of the USSC ruling and by having this support they made it so that it could not be changed via the nineteenth amendment which made it so the right to vote could not be restricted due to gender. Another ruling that deals with voting and was changed with a constitutional amendment is the “Oregon v. Mitchell” case in 1970 in which Justice Harlan concluded “…neither that Amendment nor any other provision of the Constitution authorizes Congress to set voter qualifications in state or local elections” (Harlan 1970); In response to this ruling congress put in place the twenty sixth amendment which states no state or The United States can deny the right to vote to people 18 and over in regards to age. Because of the difficulty to obtain two thirds majority vote in congress and the house there have been very few of these constitutional amendments put in place in response to a court ruling but this also leads to the few that have happened being very impactful with topics such as voting as seen above and others spanning from the topic of slavery to rights, and taxes.
The second and much more common method of overturning court rulings in congress is through a federal statute which compared to the very few constitutional amendments are plentiful. Due to the comparatively easier process of putting a statute in place the topics that they cover is also much broader than that of constitutional amendments spanning bankruptcy, crime, education, environment and much more. In 1984 the supreme court ruled in the case of Grove City College v. Bell that in regards to title IX which forbids sex discrimination “in any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance” (Title IX 1972) that private schools where students benefited from federal aid could be effected by title IX, this was overturned by the “Civil Rights Restoration Act of 1987”. This case like many others portrays the length of time the overturning of a court ruling can take, this is because the political opinion of the judiciary can change over time and decide to go back and go against a ruling or even with a current support for a statute or amendment to the constitution it can take a long time to get put into law.
Many Americans see the supreme court as the end all be all authority of the law however, these people fail to consider that because the supreme court is a part of the judicial system it is subject to checks and balances just like every other branch of government. However the checks in the relationship between these two branches function rather uniquely due to the ever changing political landscape of the United States the majority in The House and Senate can switch as often as every 2 years and therefore the rulings that might be checked by congress could change as often as that. This is in direct contrast to the supreme court where justices serve for life. Just because court justices serve for life does not mean that the court itself cannot also change over time, judicial activism and restraint can also change the relationship between congress leading to a greater use or a decline in use of checks and balances by the legislature; This is because if the court uses judicial activism and is seen as overstepping there will be an increase in attempts by congress to check their power to a level they like whereas if the court shows restraint it is less likely to conflict with the views of congress and therefore there will be less constitutional amendments or statutes that contradict a court ruling.
On a broader scale congress also has some ways to impact the court say if there is a more conservative congress but a left leaning court or vice versa and there is a vacancy, whoever holds the majority in the legislature can tilt the court more towards their ideology. This has become a bigger issue for some because of the fact that the supreme court is supposed to be nonpartisan, but in recent years as the political climate has become more divided this seems to be the case less and less. This also ties in with the republican legislatures “refusal to even consider a Supreme Court nominee” (Totenberg 2016) during the Obama administration; This refusal during a vacancy in the supreme court is virtually unheard of and showed just how far divided the judiciary can be when it comes to appointing a justice as it has a lasting effect on the relationship with the senate as well as on the country as a whole.
Every branch of the government has incredible power and due to this the need for checks and balances was seen by the founding fathers who put them in place and these checks and balances are seen today across all three branches and while some unintended or abused practices can undermine or go against the purpose of these they are largely effective in making sure no branches power goes unchecked especially the supreme court as it is the highest court in the land, and due to the content the court handles overlapping with the laws put in place by the legislature the relationship between them deserves evaluation.