As disappointing as it may be, we’re closing Contest #3 without a winner.
As you may recall, the question was:
Provide the textual portion of the US Constitution that describes the well-known concept of Judicial Review, which gives the Federal Judiciary the authority to determine the constitutionality of US or State laws. Then, please name the first Justice to implement Judicial Review in the United States.
This was a trick question, since the US Constitution does not expressly give the Judiciary Branch the power to review the constitutionality of laws. This power exists based solely on the precedent set the first time it was exercised by the Supreme Court in 1803 in the case of Marbury v. Madison. John Marshall (that’s him at the left) was the Chief Justice at that time, and wrote the decision (he also played a roll in the events that led to the case as well… can you say “conflict of interest”?). A couple of links providing details and comments around this topic are here and here. Some great background on this topic is found in The Patriot’s History of the United States by Larry Schweikart and Michael Patrick Allen. You can also find other information on the web using this Google search.
We will tee up a new context on Sunday.
Update: Some text was missing for some reason, but is corrected now.
