Marbury v Madison essays

Marbury v Madison essays In 1800, President John Adams lost his bid for re-election. Thomas Jefferson was voted in for the president. Adams, being a Federalist, disagreed with the beliefs of Jefferson, a republican, and feared that he would shift the power in the government to the states. To prevent this, Adams created many new judicial posts and filled them with Federalists. He did this in quite a rush, being he was going to be out of office soon. All the appointments were given to his Secretary of State to be sealed and delivered. Secretary of State Marshall completed all the documents except for the ones for the appointments for the District of Columbia. He assumed the next Secretary of State would complete them. When Jefferson found out about this he was mad. He order the new Secretary of State, James Madison, not to deliver the final appointments to the selected judges. One of the judges that didnt get his promised appointment was William Marbury. Marbury decided to take action in court. Marburys argume nt was supported by Section 13 of the Judiciary Act. This stated the courts could force an official to perform an official duty. This is called a writ of mandamus. Marbury took this claim to the Supreme Court. The Justice of the Supreme Court is now James Marshall, Adams old Secretary of State. If he issued the writ, Madison would ignore it and the court would be perceived as powerless. If he didnt issue it, people would think he was a traitor to his Federalist party. On February 24, 1803 a decision was rendered. It stated that Marbury was entitled to his appointment and that a court could issue a writ of madamus. He then went on to say that Section 13 was contrary to Article III of the Constitution which said that the Supreme Court had no original jurisdiction in the case. So a lesser court could legally give the writ of Mandimus. This cases importance isnt that William Marbury got his appointment as a judge in D.C. but ...