Today in Supreme Court History: July 15, 1819

7/15/1819: John Marshall publishes defense of McCulloch v. Maryland in the Alexandria Gazette under the pseudonym "A Friend of the Constitution."

Comments

[Dan Schiavetta]

Campbell v. Florida, 400 U.S. 801 (decided July 15, 1970): denies cert in murder case where defendant argued that it was error to exclude jurors who would impose death penalty only if recommendation for mercy was added (this was between Witherspoon v. Illinois, 1968, which struck a statute allowing peremptory excusals of jurors who had general objections to death penalty, and Wainwright v. Witt, 1985, can exclude automatically anti-death penalty jurors but not those who had reservations about it)

[JoeFromtheBronx]

Many people on this blog are not great friends to the letter or spirit of McCulloch v. Maryland.

Some justices continue to use off-the-bench statements and writings to defend their views. Justices have written law review articles too. Such a direct defense of a single opinion, however, by sitting judges I think is frowned upon these days.

Checking, today's case was cited in another challenge involving Campbell in 1984.

https://casetext.com/case/campbell-v-wainwright

[Dan Schiavetta]

Thanks