Montana labor news., 1937-04-08

adopted by the congress in carrying
out powers clearly delegated to il
were to be subject to a rigid judicia.
review amounting to a judicial veto
Proposals to give the Supreme Court
even a limited veto power over leg
islation were rejected by an over
whelming vote in the Constitutional
Convention.
There is considerable conflict
among historians and jurists as to
whether the power asserted by Chief
Justice Marshall in the famous case
of Marbury V. Madison to refuse to
enforce acts of the Congress on
grounds of unconstitutionality was
not itself an act of judicial usurpa-
ton. I hope that the reactionary
Democrats who SANDER his memory
by calling themselves "J~effersonian
Democrats will not forget what
Thomas Jefferson said. He did not
mince words, when he wrote:
ut has long been my opinion,
and l have never shrunk from its
expression, that the germ of dis
solution of u federal govern
ment is in the judiciary-the ir-
responsible body working like
gravity, by day and by night,
gaining a little today and gain
ing a little tomorrow, and adj
vancing its noiseless step like a
thief over the field of jurisdic-
ton until all shall be usurped"
The storm of protest rose so high
that never again in his lifetime die
John Marshall dare to apply his new
doetrine-and even suggested him
self that congress be given power
to %overrule Supreme Court decisions
The doctrine did not appear a second
time until over so years later when
another Chief Justice applied it in
the bred Scott case to plunge the
North and South alike into the Wa
Between the States and bring to the
South the shameful terrors of the
Reconstruction period. And wher
the court asserted the power the
third time in the Legal Tender case.
after the war, President Grant ap.
pointed two new justices, packed the
court if you will and the court re.
versed its own decision.
Fought Court Usurpation
The Founding Fathers, the gener.
atoms who built the spiritual anc
material foundations of this country
were opposed to judicial usurpatior
and refused to regard the Supreme
Court as s%acrosanct. The views o.
those who framed the constitution
about the proper exercise of judi.
cial power have been maintained
throughout our history by liberia.
leaders including jefferson, Jackson
Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, and my
father.
The idea of an unchecked suprem.
acy Of the Supreme Court has beer
built up only over the last 40 years
It has been built up by corporation
lawyers of the Liberty League i1l
who have tried in the court to coun.
teract the reforms, like popular cleo.
ton of senator's, which are MAKING
the will of the people the law of the
land.
It has been indoctrinated in oui
schools and in our thinking with the
same conscious direction as the pro.
paganda of the public utilities. If the
congress continues to a~cquiesce il
such a pernicious doctrine, the con.
gress will be guilty of abandoning it:
constitutional rights and duties.
The constitution provides for a
separation of powers, not for a
judicial supremacy. The idea Of
Judicial supremacy is not found
in the constitution or the writ
ings of the constitutional fathers.
1t is an idea of smart lawyers
who, beaten in the congress,
have sought for their own adj
vantage to twist and distort the