Rehnquist's achievement as Chief Justice has been to reconcile his liberal and conservative colleagues to the aggrandizement of the Supreme Court's power at the expense of Congress and the state legislatures. Following the rule of stare decisis, we decline to overrule Miranda ourselves. In other words, even if we were wrong, and Congress was right, our supremacy must be respected, and we are sticking to our guns. After all, every Justice has voted to junk less famous precedents by the passel. What is common to both situations, clearly, is that the prestige of the Supreme Court is at special risk.
Judicial review is a vital safeguard against majoritarian tyranny.
As long as we have such review, we will inevitably see popularly enacted laws swept aside based on highly debatable inferences from vague constitutional provisions by as few as five Justices. More from National Journal. More on politics and society in Atlantic Unbound and The Atlantic Monthly. Stuart Taylor Jr. is a senior writer and columnist for National Journal and a contributing editor at Newsweek.