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Neoconservative Politics and the Supreme Court

Author: Stephen M. Feldman

Publisher: NYU Press

Published: 2013

Total Pages: 236

ISBN-13: 0814764665

In this concise, timely book, constitutional law expert Stephen M. Feldman draws on neoconservative writings to explore the rise of the neocons and their influence on the Supreme Court. Neocons burst onto the political scene in the early 1980s via their assault on pluralist democracy’s ethical relativism, where no pre-existing or higher principles limit the agendas of interest groups. Instead, they advocated for a resurrection of republican democracy, which declares that virtuous citizens and officials pursue the common good. Yet despite their original goals, neocons quickly became an interest group themselves, competing successfully within the pluralist democratic arena. When the political winds shifted in 2008, however, neocons found themselves shorn of power in Congress and the executive branch. But portentously, they still controlled the Supreme Court. Neoconservative Politics and the Supreme Court explains how and why the neoconservatives criticized but operated within pluralist democracy, and, most important, what the entrenchment of neocons on the Supreme Court means for present and future politics and law.

American Government and Politics

Author: Richard T. Saeger

Publisher: Pearson Scott Foresman

Published: 1982

Total Pages: 444

ISBN-13:

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Is the Supreme Court too political and too powerful?

Author: Roy Whymark

Publisher: GRIN Verlag

Published: 2013-01-09

Total Pages: 10

ISBN-13: 3656347573

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Seminar paper from the year 2012 in the subject Politics - Region: USA, grade: 84%, Birkbeck, University of London (University of London), course: American Politics, language: English, abstract: The US Supreme Court bears the incredible responsibility for deciding the constitutional validity of cases by judging the merits of each against the Constitution. Given the context in which the Constitution was written and its often ambiguous language, the task facing the nine Justices is not simple and the Court’s activities not without controversy. The influence of the Court has generated swathes of literature concerning how the Constitution is applied and how effective those applications have been in shaping public policy. There can be little doubt that the Supreme Court is both powerful and political and has had a major impact on American society. Indeed, it was the Court that ruled racial segregation in schools to be unconstitutional (Brown v. Board of Education 1954); guaranteed the rights to counsel and due process (Gideon v. Wainwright 1963); established the constitutional right of abortion (Roe v. Wade 1973); and famously, or perhaps infamously, halted the Florida recount, effectively awarding the presidency to George W. Bush (Bush v. Gore 2000). This essay takes the notion that the Court is both political and powerful as given but explores whether it is too political and too powerful, to the degree that its decisions have a detrimental impact on the functioning of US democracy. In considering this issue, one needs to consider outcomes (how the Court has actually shaped public policy). This essay will focus on three policy areas where the Court has made landmark decisions (abortion, civil rights, and gun control) and explains that while the Court is, by its nature, highly political and also powerful, it does not operate in a vacuum and its influence on society in constrained by the separation of powers, the federal nature of politics, and public opinion. Supreme Court functions Before turning to the Supreme Court’s influence on public policy, it is worth understanding what the Court is intended for. Article III of the Constitution states that ‘the judicial power of the United States shall be vested in one supreme court’. This role manifests itself in two judicial review functions: (i) statutory interpretation; and (ii) constitutional interpretation of legislation. [...]

The Authority of the Court and the Peril of Politics

Author: Stephen Breyer

Publisher: Harvard University Press

Published: 2021-09-14

Total Pages: 113

ISBN-13: 0674270983

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A sitting justice reflects upon the authority of the Supreme Court—how that authority was gained and how measures to restructure the Court could undermine both the Court and the constitutional system of checks and balances that depends on it. A growing chorus of officials and commentators argues that the Supreme Court has become too political. On this view the confirmation process is just an exercise in partisan agenda-setting, and the jurists are no more than “politicians in robes”—their ostensibly neutral judicial philosophies mere camouflage for conservative or liberal convictions. Stephen Breyer, drawing upon his experience as a Supreme Court justice, sounds a cautionary note. Mindful of the Court’s history, he suggests that the judiciary’s hard-won authority could be marred by reforms premised on the assumption of ideological bias. Having, as Hamilton observed, “no influence over either the sword or the purse,” the Court earned its authority by making decisions that have, over time, increased the public’s trust. If public trust is now in decline, one part of the solution is to promote better understandings of how the judiciary actually works: how judges adhere to their oaths and how they try to avoid considerations of politics and popularity. Breyer warns that political intervention could itself further erode public trust. Without the public’s trust, the Court would no longer be able to act as a check on the other branches of government or as a guarantor of the rule of law, risking serious harm to our constitutional system.

Politics, Democracy, and the Supreme Court

Author: Arthur Selwyn Miller

Publisher: Praeger

Published: 1985-09-17

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 0313248311

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Miller proposes that we focus our energies on the question of how the Constitution is to function in an era of rapid and fundamental social change. He introduces this provocative collection of essays with the observation that American constitutional theory has arrived at a dead-end, largely because it has been perceived as constitutional law rather than a form of political theory. He puts this view into sharp perspective by looking at what are in effect, three constitutions--the political, the economic, and the emergent corporate instrument. He analyzes important issues that confront the Supreme Court, policymakers, and theorists, such as the expansion of government control, the Court as a political mechanism, the power of corporations, politics and the First Amendment, the challenge of nuclear weapons, and questions relating to social justice, including equal protection and the right to employment.

America at the Crossroads

Author: Francis Fukuyama

Publisher: Yale University Press

Published: 2006-01-01

Total Pages: 260

ISBN-13: 0300113994

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Presents a critique of the Bush Administration's Iraq policy, arguing that it stemmed from misconceptions about the realities of the situation in Iraq and a squandering of the goodwill of American allies following September 11th.

American Neoconservatism

Author: Jean-François Drolet

Publisher:

Published: 2014-01-16

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9780199333455

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American Neoconservatism moves beyond recent debates over the intricacies of the Bush administration's foreign policy to offer a deeper look at the philosophical premises of this 'new' conservatism in light of the historical events and changing social compacts that have created a demand for it over the past decades. It surveys neoconservative discourses on democracy, the liberal state, capitalism, national security, international law and global liberal governance, and draws attention to the systematic links between the domestic and international dimensions of neoconservative political sociology. Taking issue with neoconservatism's self-image, Drolet argues and demonstrates that American neoconservatism is not the centrist 'liberal' conservatism that it pretends to be--and that many analysts have diagnosed in recent years. To the extent that neoconservatism is committed to the Enlightenment discourse of liberalism, these commitments are firmly subordinated to an authoritarian form of cultural and philosophical conservatism, which is in fact ferociously predatory on liberal values and practices. Neoconservatism is not a conservative variant of liberalism but a deeply atavistic reaction to liberal modernity. It owes a lot more to the authoritarian intellectual milieu of interwar Europe than to the liberal tradition that its protagonists allegedly want to reform and protect against its enemies.

The Neoconservative Persuasion

Author: Irving Kristol

Publisher: Basic Books

Published: 2013-04-23

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9780465061914

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A brilliant collection of pieces, written between 1942 and his death in 2009, by Irving Kristol, one of the fathers of neoconservatism. This series of essays, many hard to find and reprinted for the first time since their initial appearance, offers a wide ranging survey of the history of neoconservatism in America. Kristol covers a broad range of topics from the neoconservative movement's roots in the 40s at City College through the triumph of Reagan and the muddle of the Iraq war. Along the way, we experience the creative development of one of the most important public intellectuals of the modern age, a man who played an extraordinarily influential role in the development of American intellectual and political culture over the past half-century. This illuminating collection features a foreword by Irving's son Bill Kristol and is edited by Irving's widow, Gertrude Himmelfarb (aka Bee Kristol), a notable conservative voice in her own right.

Neoconservatism

Author: Douglas Murray

Publisher: ReadHowYouWant.com

Published: 2010-06-29

Total Pages: 334

ISBN-13: 1458779912

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Neo conservatism: Why We Need It is a defense of the most controversial political philosophy of our era. Douglas Murray takes a fresh look at the movement that replaced Great-Society liberalism, helped Ronald Reagan bring down the Wall, and provided the intellectual rationale for the Bush administration's War on Terror. While others are blaming it for foreign policy failures and, more extremely, attacking it as a ''Jewish cabal,'' Murray argues that the West needs Neo conservatism more than ever. In addition to explaining what Neo conservatism is and where it came from, he argues that this American-born response to the failed policies of the 1960s is the best approach to foreign affairs not only for the United States but also for Britain and the West as well.

The Future of Liberalism

Author: Alan Wolfe

Publisher: Vintage

Published: 2010-02-09

Total Pages: 370

ISBN-13: 0307386252

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A compelling and deeply felt exploration and defense of liberalism: what it actually is, why it is relevant today, and how it can help our society chart a forward course. The Future of Liberalism represents the culmination of four decades of thinking and writing about contemporary politics by Alan Wolfe, one of America’s leading scholars, hailed by one critic as “one of liberalism’s last and most loyal sons.” Wolfe mines the bedrock of the liberal tradition, explaining how Immanuel Kant, John Stuart Mill, John Dewey, and other celebrated minds helped shape liberalism’s central philosophy. Wolfe also examines those who have challenged liberalism since its inception, from Jean-Jacques Rousseau to modern conservatives, religious fundamentalists, and evolutionary theorists such as Richard Dawkins. Drawing on both the inspiration and insights of seminal works such as John Locke’s Second Treatise on Government, Adam Smith’s Theory of Moral Sentiments, Kant’s essay “What is Enlightenment?,” and Mill’s On Liberty and The Subjection of Women, Wolfe ambitiously sets out to define what it truly means to be a liberal. He analyzes and applauds liberalism’s capacious conception of human nature, belief that people outweigh ideology, passion for social justice, faith in reason and intellectual openness, and respect for individualism. And we see how the liberal tradition can influence and illuminate contemporary debates on immigration, abortion, executive power, religious freedom, and free speech. But Wolfe also makes it clear that before liberalism can be successfully applied to today’s problems, it needs to be recovered, understood, and embraced—not just by Americans but by all modern people—as the most beneficial way to live in our complex modern world. The Future of Liberalism is a crucial, enlightening, and immensely rewarding step in that direction.