Key Landmark Decisions of the Supreme Court - Assignment Example

? Key Landmark Decisions of the Supreme Court First Key Landmark Decisions of the Supreme Court Abstract Two landmark decisions of the United States of America Supreme Court, Plessy v. Ferguson, 163 U.S. 537 (1896) and Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436 (1966) have a played a key role in anchoring constitutionalism and have provided a varied interpretation of the constitution in everyday judicial decisions. The decisions have been landmarks not just in their interpretation of weighty constitutional imperatives but also in the canonical logic applied in arriving at them. The rulings were important in shaping application of the constitution in practical terms (Plessy v. Ferguson) and also in securing the rights of the accused person in protecting his or her innocence (Miranda v. Arizona). Introduction In the Plessy v. Ferguson case, Homer Plessy challenged the Louisiana law requiring that black and white people ride in separate coaches on trains. His argument was that the 14th Amendment of the constitution was meant to guarantee equal protection and due process under the law. However the Supreme Court ruled that segregation under state law was constitutional as long as the facilities provided for the different races were equal. This “separate but equal” ruling sets the stage for segregation laws that stayed in force for the next 60 years. In the Miranda v. The Arizona Supreme Court held that an accused person’s confession was not to be admitted in court if it was found that he or she was not informed of their right to counsel or having themselves protected against self-incrimination. It forms the basis of the Miranda warnings that are issued up to the present day before any interrogation by an arrested person is initiated (Landmark Rulings of the United States Supreme Court, n.d.). 1. The Plessy v. Ferguson decision was made at a time when a majority of the United States had segregation laws in place, when the notion that segregation of the races was necessary to ensure law and social order. That seven of the nine Judges of the Supreme Court saw the decision as not in any way offending the Fourteenth Amendment of the constitution could be deduced from the fact that even as the Fourteenth Amendment was being passed the public gallery in the congress was segregated. In passing the ruling, Justice Henry Brown noted that the “Separate but equal” statute merely implied a legal distinction between black and white and that it did not violate the Amendment because it could not have been intended to abolish distinctions based on race or to enforce social equality. As far as the majority Justices were concerned, as long as the statute did not discriminate against the black population politically and merely sought to enforce social order then it was legal and constitutional. This very narrow interpretation of the constitution was entirely in line with the thinking at the time and was accepted and endorsed by all except one of the judges of the Supreme Court (Amar, 2011). In the Miranda v. Arizona ruling, the appellant had objected to the use of a confession that had been made without the accused being made aware of their Fifth Amendment rights (the right to not involuntarily incriminate oneself) and also on this Sixth Amendment right (the right to legal counsel, provided free of charge if the accused cannot afford it). The Supreme Court ruling was a landmark in the way accused persons are questioned prior to being charged in court. It also made the reading of the accused’s rights a mandatory requirement. Initially there was fear that this decision would lead to as one of the justices said, the setting free of killers, rapists and other criminals who would then go out and commit crime again but it also emphasized the doctrine of presumption of innocence, a key constitutional right (Schauer, 2013). 1A. In the Plessy v. Ferguson ruling, the lone dissenting voice was of Associate Justice John Marshall Harlan of Kentucky who held that the constitution is color blind and that whereas the white race see itself as the dominant race in prestige achievements, education and in power, that perceived superiority was unconstitutional since there was no dominant ruling class of citizens. He held that all citizens were equal before the law. He also stated that If evils were to come out of the coming together of the two races on public highways that are there for the use of all, they will be less than those that come from laws that regulate the enjoyment of civil rights based on someone’s race. In the fullness of time, his courageous stand and decision has been vindicated, with his standing out as the sole voice of reason in that judicial decision (Hall & Patrick, 2006). In the Miranda v Arizona ruling there was a thin 5-4 majority, with the strongest dissenting voices coming from Justice Byron White and John Marshall Harlan II. Justice Byron White predicted that the Miranda ruling would have the grim consequences of returning a killer, a rapist or other criminal to the streets and the environment which created him, to repeat the crime. Indeed the appellant in the Miranda case, Ernesto Miranda was released on parole and then ironically stabbed to death by a defendant who opted to exercise his right to silence and was subsequently released without being charged for Ernesto’s murder. 1B. The political ideology of the day always influences constitutional law interpretation as can be seen in both of these cases. In the Plessy v. Ferguson, the white majority of the day, while proclaiming equality of the races under the constitution, practiced a form of legally approved bigotry under the segregation laws of the day, which was clearly skewed in favor of the whites and treated the colored people as inferior beings. The decision handed down by the 7-1 majority of the Supreme Court was clearly in keeping with the political ideology that was at play in the society then, with segregation being implemented in many of the states and with the policy being enforced as a social standard and to maintain public health and safety. Segregation existed not just in public conveyances such as buses and trains but also in schools and these laws went unchallenged, hence the Supreme Court’s ruling was in keeping with the politics of the time. In the Miranda v Arizona case, the ruling was made at a time when, due to public pressure that the police appeared “soft” on crime, there were consistent accusations of heavy-handedness on the part of the police in enforcing the law, especially when it regarded minorities and other underprivileged members of society. As a result of this judgment clear and strict instructions for police to follow before they interrogate suspects were put in place. The police would have to inform suspects that they have the right to choose to remain silent, that any words that they say may be used against them, that they have a right to lawyer and that one would be provided for them if they couldn’t afford it. It is also their right to have the lawyer present when being questioned and most importantly, all this information must be availed to them before any questioning takes place, otherwise any information so gained would be inadmissible in a court of law. This during the height of civil rights movement made a lot of sense at the time and was also politically expedient (Josset, 1996). 1C. The language of both the decisions and the dissenting views of the day also strongly reflected the mood of the day. In the Plessy v. Ferguson ruling, for example, the Justices were at pains to interpret the decidedly racist and clearly white-race favoring law to conform with what was the conventional wisdom of the day, that the segregation was allowed due to public health and safety concerns and that it had nothing to with the political rights of the coloreds which were at par with those of the whites. Also the dissenting voice of John Marshall Harlan was also equally strident. He is actually the one who said that the white race had a white supremacist agenda that was implied in the separate but equal doctrine. In the Miranda v Arizona ruling the Supreme Court clearly saw the need to interpret the law in a way that was consistent with the constitution, to the detail of actually stating what the Miranda warnings would eventually be and coming up with the wording for the cautions that would be given to an accused person and the way the message would be communicated to the person. As a result a standard Miranda warning was adopted for use by every police department to ensure that they were all at an equal footing and ensure that the letter and intent of the constitution was implemented. The dissenting voices of the Miranda ruling also give the points that would be looked at in future jurisprudence and provided the issues that would be looked at in later improvements of implementing and carrying out the law, which resulted in future positive revisions of the law (Hall & Patrick, 2006). 2. The political climate during the Plessy v Ferguson case was one especially in the southern states where there was a feeling of skepticism by the 60 million strong white population about the minority 6 million colored people. There were a lot of misgivings about what would happen if the coloreds were given the exact same rights as the whites and this obviously colored the court’s decision. The Judges on the Supreme Court had also been largely nominated to their position by conservative Republicans who were more concerned with the preservation of society as it was than with the promotion of civil liberties. Therefore it was in their interest to make a ruling that would be popular with the general population, who despite the passing of the Fourteenth Amendment, still genuinely believed that there was need to promote the “separate but equal” doctrine of the day. In the Miranda v Arizona ruling, it was done at the height of civil liberties activism when human rights and the equality of not just the sexes but the races was a rallying call. The governments of the day were more Democrats than Republicans, hence the greater emphasis on civil rights and correction of perceived historical injustices. The ruling was as important as it was controversial, with some feeling that it was representing too much of libertarian ideology and would lead to an increase in crime by giving suspects too many rights while at the same time tying down the policeman’s hands in their fight against crime. In both cases the passage of time proved the ruling wrong (in the case of Plessy v Ferguson) and right (in the case of Miranda v Arizona) (Josset, 1996). 3. In the Plessy v Ferguson the court was heavily influenced by the philosophical leanings of the time which basically approved of a divided nation. The southerners who had only begrudgingly accepted the premise, which was still “wrong” to them, that the colored people were equal to the white people, had reached what to them was an acceptable compromise. That made the races “separate but equal” which worked well in theory but not really well in practice. These philosophical leanings that somehow the white race needed to be protected from contamination by the colored race hence the need for the separation. This was all couched in the forms of public health and safety concerns so as to make it palatable and more justifiable. These were the basic precepts that justified the decision and made it acceptable to the majority white population in the southern states. In the Miranda v Arizona decision period, the common feeling at the time that people were due their inalienable rights and that ignorance of the law was no excuse for breaking the law or denying citizens their rights. That was the morality and argument that forced the Supreme Court to rule as it did. There were of course a minority who believed that those that were ignorant of the law did not deserve to benefit from its application but with the greater civic awareness and growth of the rights movement, the push for individual and human rights clearly won the day. 4. In the Plessy v Ferguson decision, the courts interpreted the US constitution in a narrow manner that has time and time again been shown to have been both wrong and short-sighted at the time. The courts were also more politically inclined and read the constitution in a more politically “correct” manner than they did in later years. There was also a less diverse composition of the Supreme Court leading to the unanimity of the decision that they handed down with only one, at the time decidedly odd dissenter in the person of Justice John Marshall Harlan (Greene, 2011). This reflected the ruling political class of the time who had access to positions of authority in the judicial system. During the Miranda v Arizona ruling time period, the court interpreted the constitution in a more diverse way and took greater cognizance of the doctrine of innocent until proven guilty which is a one of the key tenets of the US constitution. It also took a broader view of due process and therefore gave the accused person a clearer more, stricter and better outlined process. This also had a bigger impact on race relations as a greater number of the disadvantaged persons that found themselves at the wrong end of the law were often of colored origin. Conclusion Both of these were key rulings made by the US Supreme Court and both had a long-standing influence in the practice and interpretation of the constitution in a way that is both far reaching in both impact and scope. Through the test of time the infamy of the Plessey v. Ferguson ruling and its impact on the subjugation of civil liberties has stood out and has for long been seen as one of the most unfortunate interpretations of the constitution. The Miranda v Arizona ruling has also had the impact of shaping the practice of law and especially the application of the Fifth and Sixth Amendments of the constitution. References Amar, A. R. (2011). Plessy v. Ferguson and the Anti-Canon. Pepperdine Law Review, 39(75), 75-90. Retrieved May 20, 2013, from http://digitalcommons.law.yale.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4706&context=fss_papers Greene, J. L. (2011, December). The Anticanon. Harvard Law Review, 125(2), 379-475. Retrieved May 20, 2013, from http://www.harvardlawreview.org/media/pdf/vol125_greene.pdf Hall, K. L., & Patrick, J. (2006). The Of Justice Supreme Court Decisions That Shaped America. Retrieved May 20, 2013, from http://www.annenbergclassroom.org/Files/Documents/Books/The%20Pursuit%20of%20Justice/Pursuit_of_Justice.pdf Landmark Rulings of the United States Supreme Court. (n.d.). Retrieved May 20, 2013, from http://www.twyman-whitney.com/constitutiontest/landmarkrulingssupremecourt.pdf Josset, J. L. (1996). May it Please the Constitution: Judicial Activism and its Effect on Criminal Procedure. Marquette Law Review, 79(4), 1021-1040. Retrieved May 20, 2013, from http://scholarship.law.marquette.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1555&context=mulr Schauer, F. (2013). The Miranda Warning. Washington Law Review, 88(1), 155- 170. Retrieved May 20, 2013, from http://digital.law.washington.edu/dspace-law/bitstream/handle/1773.1/1221/88WLR155.pdf?sequence=1 Read More