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Change is a Sometimes Thing: Constitutional Jurisprudence in the United States

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The Politics of Constitutional Reform in North America

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Abstract

Virtually from the beginning, controversy has surrounded the role of the Supreme Court within the American political system. Once the Court asserted its authority to declare the acts of other governmental agencies null and void for violating the Constitution (Marbury v. Madison 1803), the Court could not conceal its policy-making functions. That, in turn, provoked the continuing debate about the legitimacy of the Court’s role. More recently, however, scholars have begun systematically to explore the Court’s capabilities to influence public policy formulation. Given the inevitable policy effects of judicial decisions, scholars have sought the conditions under which judicial decisions produce political and social change. The aim here is to suggest the factors which support or limit the Supreme Court’s ability to promote change through its constitutional decisions.

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Authors
  1. Martin Edelman
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Augsburg, Germany

    Rainer-Olaf Schultze (Professor of Political Science and Managing Director of the Institute for Canadian Studies) (Professor of Political Science and Managing Director of the Institute for Canadian Studies)

  2. University of Erlangen-Nuremberg, Germany

    Roland Sturm (Professor of Political Science and Head of the Institute of Political Science) (Professor of Political Science and Head of the Institute of Political Science)

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© 2000 Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden

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Edelman, M. (2000). Change is a Sometimes Thing: Constitutional Jurisprudence in the United States. In: Schultze, RO., Sturm, R. (eds) The Politics of Constitutional Reform in North America. VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, Wiesbaden. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-663-11628-8_12

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-663-11628-8_12

  • Publisher Name: VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, Wiesbaden

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-663-11630-1

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-663-11628-8

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

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