The Supreme Court of the United States is the country’s highest ranking judicial body that deals with the most significant legal matters of national importance. According to McCloskey & Levinson, (2016), the membership of the US Supreme Court as stipulated by the Judiciary act of 1869 constitutes the Chief Justice of the United States together with the eight associate judges who form the board of judges. However, six of the judges can form a quorum. In the recent past decades, there have been significant events that have marked changes in the US Supreme Court under the leadership of both Chief Justices Earl Warren and William Rehnquist. This paper attempts to compare and contrast various approaches to criminal justice under both chief justices by focusing on how criminal procedure balanced between maintenance of social order and upholding of civil liberties. Further, the paper discuses current approaches to criminal justice by the Supreme Court of the United States in comparison to its former approaches.
The period between 1953 and 1969 during which Chief Justice Earl Warren presided over the United States Supreme Court was marked by sweeping changes in the constitution especially in the areas of criminal procedure, legislative appointment and race relations (Mayo, 2014). On the other hand, William Rehnquist presided over the US Supreme Court between 1986 and 2005 when he died, which not only distinguished him as one of the longest serving US Chief Justices but also the president of the US Supreme Court who reigned over the highest court amid rapid changes in the socio-political arena, mostly marked by agitations for racial equality and fairness (Mayo, 2014).
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The Supreme Court of the United States under the leadership of Chief Justices Earl Warren and William Rehnquist was marked by a number of significant differences that mostly centered on civil rights permissiveness and the federal law of the United States. While Earl Warren is considered a liberalist and is remembered for having expanded civil rights, judicial power, civil liberties and federal power, William Rehnquist is remembered mostly for the conservatism stance he held mostly favoring the federalism conception that mostly emphasized the Tenth Amendment’s reservation of powers to the states. It was under the view of Rehnquist that the court struck down an act of congress as exceeding its powers as provided for by the commerce clause ( McCloskey & Levinson, 2016) .
The major clause that was emphasized upon by the Warren court was the 14 th Amendment Due Process clause for which the court was both applauded and criticized, mostly having brought to the end the racial segregation in the United States and incorporating the Bill of Rights ( Moke, 2015) . The Warren court also ended officially sanctioned voluntary prayer in the United States public schools ( Rosiek & Kinslow, 2015) . Most significantly, the Warren period is historically recognized as the highest point in the judicial power that ever receded, but with a substantial lasting impact. On contrary, Rehnquist court held a restrictive view both on the prisoners’ and the criminals’ right, and one of the most significant views of this judicial era was the view that capital punishment was constitutionally permissible. He strongly supported the view that the Fourth Amendment guaranteed warrantless search incident to validate an arrest. As opposed Warren who majorly favored the 14 th Amendment, Rehnquist favored federalism conception.
Another significant difference between Warren court and Rehnquist court was the general philosophy and approach to leadership. While Warren’s principles were mostly philosophical, intuitive and political, Rehnquist considered judicial powers legal in the conventional technical sense, and this overlooked an undermined most of the civil rights of the US citizens at the expense of the federal law and social order maintenance. Warren was a socio-political leader who regarded constitution and law enforcement of human rights and in his view of the law, equality in civil rights and balance of power between the state and the civil society were the guiding principles to his leadership (Napolitano, 2013). One of the most significant ideals was the desire for the unanimous court in the leading school desegregation case in which he declared that separation and segregation of school-going children on the basis of their racial and ethnic extraction was unconstitutional. Rehnquist’s long academic and professional background in the practice of law prompted him to become a conservative leader of the court who mostly emphasized on the original intent of the constitutional developers, often disregarding changes in the socio-political arena (Moke, 2015).
In Watkins v. United States in 1957, Warren led the court to uphold the right of a witness to decline testifying before a congressional committee as well as other opinions concerning the state and federal security and loyalty investigations. Similarly, he discounted the fear of communist subversion that had prevailed in the country for a long time, especially in the mid 1950s. One of the most significant achievements of Rehnquist was his significant reduction of the court caseload and the improvement of efficiency of the court functioning. For instance, the court curtailed affirmative action and also curbed the congress ability to expand the federal authority. In deference to the rights of the states, the federal laws that regulated conduct as disparate as the religious expression, criminal procedure and intrastate were invalidated ( Moke, 2016).
In their leadership of the US Supreme Court during their respective terms as described above, both Chief Justices Earl Warren and William Rehnquist impacted differently on the balance between individual liberties and maintenance of social order. During the reign of Earl Warren, he enforced the notion that human beings lived in a dynamic world associated with continuous changes and that amid these changes, humans were highly predisposed and prevalent to adversity and violation of rights if the judicial system strictly conformed to the exact standards of the judicial system. Therefore, Warren’s reign attempted to exert a balance between individual citizens’ liberties and the balance of social and national order. In this regard, both civil liberties and maintenance of social order were considered important building blocks and core elements of a stable and responsible judicial system ( Unah, 2009). This approach was different from Rehnquist’s reign. By upholding the notion of a “Living Constitution (1976)”, Rehnquist articulated the paramount position that the court held and the role it played in a democratic society and thus concluded that the deference top lawmaking majorities and judicial restraint were essential elements and the building blocks of a responsible society. This notion had a strong implication on the approaches to criminal procedure under Rehnquist’s judicial system. First, it led to strict adherence to the rule of law and compromised the need to judge cases based on the circumstances ( Schmidt, 2014).
While Earl Warren acknowledged that personal freedom was incomparable to the national security and civil liberty, his leadership over the US judiciary system advocated for the full protection of the universal human rights. According to Warren’s ideals, his judicial reign sought to restore personal freedom that had been for a long time in history been misused. Common instances of human rights abuse against which Warren based his governance included racial segregation and inequality, unfairness in criminal judgment among other social and political issues. Although Warren did not exclusively dismiss the importance of national security and social order, he was against powers and judgment that exercised outright infringement and unfair restriction of human rights and their freedom. Warren’s leadership of the US Supreme court implied that national security was a concept that could not be explained in definite terms. However, human right was clear and worth of protection at all times. Therefore, attempting to violate citizens’ rights that ought to be protected at all times in the quest for “perfect” national order was a judicial malpractice on the side of citizens. Rather, protection of individual rights would consequently result in the much desired social and national order.
William Rehnquist’s leadership also relied on the opinion that all citizens belonged to the country and any threat to the national security and civil liberty was a threat to each individual’s safety and rights as well. This implies that Rehnquist considered the interests of the sovereign law more important than a single individual’s or minority interests. Therefore, in case of any conflict of interests between the country and an individual, Rehnquist considered sacrificing an individual’s liberty for the sake of the state’s well-being. Thus Rehnquist largely applied the principles Napolitano system of judiciary and criminal justice (Napolitano, 2013). As a result, Rehnquist hinged his leadership on the idea that sometimes it became absolutely necessary to curtail individual’s freedom to express some ideas, feelings and thoughts as a way of preserving mutually shared rights. For instance, citizens would not be allowed to exercise their freedom of speech to abuse or speak out insightful sentiments. In such a case, citizens’ freedom of speech would be sacrificed for the sake of civil liberty.
Currently, the Supreme Court of the United States is the last resort. Generally, it is an appellate court which operates under the directory review, implying that the court can choose the kind of case to hear by granting writs of the certiorari. Therefore, there exists no basic right of appeal that automatically extents all the way to the Supreme Court. However, the US Supreme Court is considered a court of original jurisdiction in some rare situations such as lawsuits between and among the state governments as well as some cases between the state and the federal government.
Presently, the Supreme Court of the United States is headed by Chief Justice John Roberts who is also the head of the United States federal court system. The chief justice is one of the nine Supreme Court justices. The US Supreme Court is charged with the responsibility of ensuring that all the citizens fairly receive the promise of equal justice as provided by the law as well as functioning as a guardian and interpreter of the constitution. According to Linder (n.d) , the Supreme Court of the United States under the leadership of the Chief Justice John Roberts strives to balance the constitution that is designed to provide a strong and flexible national government with all the needs of the republic that is limited to protect the guaranteed citizens’ rights. It is therefore a balance between the society need’s for social order and the individual rights to freedom and liberty.
In summary, the Supreme Court of the United States has a long history and has evolved throughout decades to its present state of the balance between the need for social order and personal freedom of citizens. The comparison between the two Chief justices of the US Earl Warren and William Rehnquist manifests considerably different manner in which they exercised leadership over the US Supreme Court of the United States. Generally Earl Warren was a liberalist who expanded civil rights and upheld individual need for freedom while William Rehnquist believed in conservatism and worked towards ensuring complete national order. Despite these differences, the current US Supreme Court leadership and the entire judicial system emphasizes on the equal balance between civil liberty and maintenance of social order. For instance the Supreme Court ruling on a constitutional issue is virtually final.
References
Linder, D. (n.d.). Retrieved November 15, 2017, from http://law2.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/conlaw/supremecourtintro.html
Mayo, E. (2014). The social problems of an industrial civilisation . Routledge.
McCloskey, R. G., & Levinson, S. (2016). The American supreme court . University of Chicago Press.
Moke, P. (2015). Earl Warren and the Struggle for Justice . Lexington Books.
Napolitano, A. (2013). “Giving up Liberty for Security.” Reason.com. Retrieved from http://reason.com/archives/2013/07/25/giving-up-liberty-for-security
Rosiek, J., & Kinslow, K. (2015). Resegregation as curriculum: The meaning of the new racial segregation in US public schools . Routledge.
Schmidt, C. W. (2014). The Partisan: The Life of William Rehnquist. Constitutional Commentary , 29 (2), 271-293.
Unah, I. (2009). The Impact of U.S. Supreme Court Decisions. The Supreme Court in American Politics, 165-188. doi:10.1057/9780230102354_7
