The Supreme Court: Functions of judiciaries; judicial independence.
Membership, appointment process and issues of judicial review; accountability and democratic control. Theories of judicial activism and restraint.

The supreme Court is the head of the judicial part of Government in the USA, it acts as an appellant court which can also on occasion deal with ambassadorial and diplomat cases. It is separate from the other 2 branches of government in order to remain independent and provides a powerful check on those branches. However it has been criticised by being called democratically lacking. The members have a significant amount of power however are unelected and unable to be dismissed.

The most significant issue with the Supreme Court’s power is its (lack of) accountability, this is largely caused by the appointment process. The Supreme court has had significant influence over public legislation since the Marbury vs Madison case of 1803 and increasingly so since Chief Justice Warren’s court who made controversial decisions regarding segregation (Brown vs Topeka) and Abortion (Roe vs Wade). This has continued to more recent court cases such as the 2012 Windsor vs USA which recognised gay marriage striking down DOMA (the 1996 Defence of Marriage Act) which stated that only heterosexual marriage would be federally recognised. This has led to the appointment process of Supreme Justices to come under scrutiny as it invokes unelected justices making decisions that will affect the whole of America and which in many cases supersede decisions made by the elected legislators (congressmen) and the executive (the President). For example firstly in 2012 the Supreme Court voted to uphold the Affordable Healthcare Act or ‘Obamacare’ arguing that it was a tax and not a mandate making it constitutional, something the Republican Party greatly disagreed