scholarly journals 1968: One Year In the Life of the Mexican Federal Judiciary

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 3
Author(s):  
Héctor Fix-Fierro

1968 is considered a mythical year in many parts of the world. In Mexico, it has acquired an almost sacred status. The student movement is com¬monly viewed as the beginning of the prolonged process of democratic transition that has unfolded in the last decades. Although there is very abundant literature about the events of that year, the role that the Mexican Federal Judiciary (MFJ) played in them has practically not been examined. The article analyzes the si¬tuation and performance of the Supreme Court of Justice and the MFJ during that single year. For this purpose, the essay examines the following aspects: the composition, organization and resources of the federal courts; judicial statistics; judicial precedents; judicial ideology and public perception on the justice system; and finally, the intervention of federal judges in the judicial proceedings instituted against the students and other leftist political dissidents. The article concludes that the MFJ was subject to many constraints and limitations that, for good measure, hampered its role in the defense of constitutional order. Twenty years later the reforms leading to the transformation of the Supreme Court of Justice into a constitutional court were started, favoring a more active intervention of judges and courts in the protection and defense of fundamental rights.

Author(s):  
Cynthia Belén Contreras

Las sentencias exhortativas de la Corte Suprema de Justicia de la Nación son un instituto jurídico de reciente y novedosa aparición en nuestro sistema argentino de derecho. Entre los años 2005 a 2012, la Corte Argentina, llegó el punto más álgido en lo que respecta a la producción y dictado de este tipo de sentencias atípicas, sobre todo en casos complejos y de transcendencia pública e institucional que involucraban a su vez derechos fundamentales. Nuestro país, está dando los primeros pasos en lo que respecta al dictado de sentencias exhortativas y en el camino se ha topado con algunos obstáculos al momento de la ejecución de sentencia. Este trabajo propone la identiicación y descripción de dichas dificultades con las que deben lidiar los operadores jurídicos, víctimas y actores a los fines de hacer realidad los derechos declarados en las sentencias exhortativas de la Corte.Abstract The exhortative sentences of the Supreme Court of Justice are a legal institute of recent and novel appearance in our Argentine system of law. From 2005 to 2012, the Argentine Supreme Court reached to the highest point with regard to the production and delivery of this type of atypical sentences, especially in complex cases of public and institutional transcendence which involved fundamental rights. Our country is taking the irst steps regarding the issuance of exhortative sentences and along the way it appears some obstacles at the time of the execution of the sentences. his work proposes the identiication and description of the diiculties with which legal operators, victims and actors must deal with in order to make the rights declared in the Court's exhortative judgments a reality.


Author(s):  
Dodek Adam ◽  
Way Rosemary Cairns

This chapter explains the constitutional status of the Supreme Court of Canada with attention to the Court’s composition, jurisdiction, and procedure. The chapter discusses the Supreme Court’s 2014 decision in Reference re Supreme Court Act, ss 5 and 6 and considers whether and how that decision limits Parliament’s authority to make changes to the Court. Both the process for appointing Supreme Court of Canada justices and the process for appointing other federal judges to the country’s superior courts are explained. The authors argue that both appointment processes are inconsistent with democratic ideals of transparency and accountability. They examine the emerging scholarly and professional consensus on the importance of institutional diversity on the bench, and conclude that the continuing lack of diversity in the federal judiciary raises legitimate political and constitutional concerns.


Author(s):  
Louis Fisher

This article discusses the concept of state secrets privilege which is designed to prevent private litigants from gaining access to agency documents sought in cases involving National Security Agency (NSA) surveillance, extraordinary rendition, and other intelligence programs. Before the Reynolds case, the Supreme Court recognized the state secrets privilege. Over the past half century, federal judges gave “deference” to the executive claims on sensitivity and confidentiality of agency records without ever looking at the disputed document. However in 1953, the Supreme Court was misled by the government. Since then, there has been an interest in having Congress enact legislation to assure greater independence for the federal judiciary and provide a more even playing field for private litigants.


2018 ◽  
Vol 1 (103) ◽  
pp. 381
Author(s):  
Kayamba Tshitshi Ndouba

Resumen:El presente artículo aborda algunos problemas entre política y derecho que genera la decisión parlamentaria en la concesión o denegación de los suplicatorios. Por ello, analiza la praxis de los suplicatorios tramitados por el Congreso de los diputados y el Senado hasta la fecha, poniendo énfasis en la doctrina emanada de las decisiones adoptadas por las comisiones parlamentarias competentes. Para profundizar en la interacción entre suplicatorio, política y derecho, el artículo indaga en los pasos cualitativos y saltos prominentes de la evolución de la jurisprudencia constitucional sobre los límites de la facultad de las Cámaras para conceder o denegar el suplicatorio. Recaba y sistematiza el tratamiento académico de los puntos clave del debate emanado de estos sucesivos pronunciamientos del TC: las implicaciones de esta jurisprudencia en relación a los postulados constitucionales de independencia y ordenación de los poderes del Estado, las definiciones de criterios jurídicos que han de inspirar y guiar a las Cámaras para autorizar o denegar el suplicatorio, la concreción del modelo y la estructura de ponderación aplicables en los casos de colisión de dos derechos fundamentales (en este caso, los arts. 23 y 24 de la Constitución española [CE]). Summary:I. Praxis of the Parliamentary Procedure for the Waiver of Immunity. II. The Request to Waive the Parliamentary Immunity Before the Constitutional Court. Issues With Undeniable Constitutional Significance. III. The Constitutional Court and the Judicial Review of the Requests to Waive the Parliamentary Immunity. 1. Interna corporis acta and fundamental rights. 2. «Trial of opportunity» and the formal «requirement of a statement of reasons». 3. The degree of providing an adequate statement of reasons in the denial court’s decision. 4. The question of weighing up different values against one another: fundamental rights and the Parliament members’ prerogatives. IV. The Doctrinal Debate on the Constitutional Court’s Jurisprudence. 1. Emptying the parliamentarian immunity and the issue of «checks and balance» of State’s constitutional powers.2. Opposing the parliamentary immunity and the right of judicial action: the issue of preferential treatment. Concluding: Judicial Review or Political Review? Abstract:This article addresses the existing problems generated by the parliamentary decision in the granting or denial of requests made by the Supreme Court to the Parliament, in order to remove an MP’s parliamentary immunity, so that (s)he can be prosecuted. Such problems are studied both from the perspective of law and of political science. To this end, this paper analyzes and updates the research done to date about the parliamentary praxis on this issue, highlighting the doctrine which emanates from the decisions adopted by the competent parliamentary committees. In order to understand well the interaction between the praxis, politics and law, this paper also examines the most prominent changes and milestones in the evolution of the constitutional case law on the limits of the Parliament’s capacity to grant or to deny the Supreme Court request asking Parliament to remove an MP’s parliamentary immunity so that (s)he can be prosecuted. For this purpose, the paper systematizes the key points of the academic debate concerning the successive decisions of the Constitutional court: the repercussions of this jurisprudence vis-à-vis the constitutional postulates of separation and independence of State powers, the legal criteria that such postulates must inspire and in order to guide the Parliament in its decision to grant or deny the petition, the concretization of the model and the balance needed in cases of collision of two fundamental rights (in this case, articles 23 and 24 of the Spanish Constitution).


1971 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 113-131
Author(s):  
Thierry Verhelst

SUMMARYFrancophone African constitutions generally make provision for fundamental rights. In criminal proceedings, the principle nulla poena sine lege is expressly incorporated in some, but not all, the constitutions. All the constitutions legislate against arbitrary arrest and detention; some legislate against brutality and torture. But these rights are subject to numerous exceptions and limitations.African countries generally distinguish between constitutional provisions and ordinary laws; the former are supreme, and may only be amended by special procedures. Constitutionality of legislation is generally judged in the francophone states by the Supreme Court or a special tribunal (this procedure differs from that in the parent French and Belgian constitutions). Within each Supreme Court there are normally several chambers or divisions: judicial review of the constitutionality of legislation is generally the business of a constitutional chamber of the Supreme Court. There is often a political element in the nomination of the persons to serve on such a special constitutional court.


2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter M. Shane

This article examines two issues regarding the Constitution’s Impeachment Clause and the federal judiciary: first, is impeachment the sole permissible mechanism for judicial removal? Second, who, if anyone is authorized to discipline federal judges through sanctions short of removal? This article argues that a form of “strict originalism,” that is, the attempt to discern the Constitution’s resolution of particular issues according to the founders’ expectations regarding those very issues—makes sense with respect to political mechanisms for judicial discipline and removal. Political mechanisms are those which can by fully initiated and implemented by the elected branches of the federal government without the involvement of the judiciary. However, employing “neoclassical” constitutional interpretation—examining general values revealed by the founders’ debates about the Constitution as a whole rather than highly specific original understandings of particular questions—demonstrates that (1) federal judges may also be disciplined through judicially enforceable civil and criminal sanctions imposed through executive or independent counsel prosecution, and (2) the federal judiciary, subject to congressional regulation, may exercise powers of self-regulation for judges not sitting on the Supreme Court.


2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (4) ◽  
pp. 150-172
Author(s):  
Václav Stehlík ◽  
David Sehnálek

Abstract The article analyses the use of the preliminary ruling procedure by the Czech courts in the 15 years of the Czech membership in the European Union. It presents statistics of cases lodged to the EU Court of Justice and refers to the most important decisions. The article compares the practise of both lower courts as well as courts of last instance, namely the Supreme Court and the Supreme Administrative Court. It also outlines the attitude of the Czech Constitutional Court towards this procedure.


Author(s):  
Antonela Bordignon

El presente artículo analizará el fallo dictado por la Corte Suprema de Justicia de la Nación, a través del cual, hacen lugar al recurso extraordinario y deja sin efecto la sentencia impugnada por la demandada en la causa “C.T., N c/OSDE s/amparo de Salud”.  El órgano supremo de Justicia de la Nación consideró que la alzada carecía de fundamentos que dieran sustento a su decisión; así como también existía una clara omisión en la valoración de las pruebas aportadas por la parte demandada, lo que la colocaba en una situación desventajosa. Entiende la Corte que se está frente a otra de las tantas sentencias arbitrarias. ¿Incide entonces que se trate de derechos fundamentales, como es el derecho a la salud? ¿Pierden objetividad los magistrados cuando se encuentran involucrados esta clase de derechos? Se intentará dilucidar a continuación.   This article will analyze the sentence handed down by the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation, through which, it leaves the sentence contested by the defendant in the case “CT, N c / OSDE s / amparo de Salud” without effect. The Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation considered that the elevation lacked grounds to support its decision; as well as there was a clear omission in the assessment of the evidence provided by the defendant, which placed it in a disadvantageous situation. The Court understands that it is facing another of the many arbitrary sentences. Does it imply that these are fundamental rights, such as the right to health? ¿Do magistrates lose objectivity when this kind of rights is involved? Attempts will be made to clarify below.


2021 ◽  
pp. 201-221
Author(s):  
Shenita Brazelton ◽  
Dianne M. Pinderhughes

We examine the demographics of the federal judiciary and the impact President Obama had on diversifying the federal bench. We discuss the record-breaking number of women and minorities Obama appointed to federal courts at all levels. Considering the historic and current struggles of African Americans in attaining civil rights, we focus our discussion on the appointment of Black federal judges. We highlight the historic firsts for African American appointees and the continuing need for Black federal judges, particularly in the South. We also discuss the inclusionary dilemma in the context of President Obama’s selections for staffing the federal judiciary. We discuss Obama’s decision not to appoint a third African American justice to the Supreme Court, but we examine his record-breaking number of African American appointments to the lower federal courts. Despite these historic appointments, President Obama’s appointment power was not unfettered. In the end, we assess the impact of Obama’s appointees in view of voting rights litigation. Voting rights are particularly pertinent for racial minorities who have been historically denied these rights but have made gains in electing minorities to public office. In the conclusion, we discuss the racial implications of the Trump administration’s attempts to reverse Obama’s judicial legacy.


Author(s):  
Martin S. Flaherty

In the past several decades, there has been a growing chorus of voices contending that the Supreme Court and federal judiciary should stay out of foreign affairs and leave the field to Congress and the president. Challenging this idea, this book argues instead for a robust judicial role in the conduct of U.S. foreign policy. The book demonstrates that the Supreme Court and federal judiciary have the power and duty to apply the law without deference to the other branches. Turning first to the founding of the nation, the book shows that the Constitution's original commitment to separation of powers was as strong in foreign as domestic matters, not least because the document shifted enormous authority to the new federal government. This initial conception eroded as the nation rose from fledgling state to superpower, fueling the growth of a dangerously formidable executive that today asserts near-plenary foreign affairs authority. The book explores how modern international relations makes the commitment to balance among the branches of government all the more critical and considers implications for modern controversies that the judiciary will continue to confront. At a time when executive and legislative actions in the name of U.S. foreign policy are only increasing, the book makes the case for a zealous judicial defense of fundamental rights involving global affairs.


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