Experimenting: Essays with Samuel Weber

Chapter 1: ‘‘God Bless America!’’

c h a p t e r 1 ‘‘God Bless America!’’ Samuel Weber ‘‘We the People . . .’’ In the almost two centuries since Tocqueville published the first volume of De la démocratie en Amérique (Democracy in America)1 so much has changed that it is both astonishing and sobering to discover, again and again, how suggestive and incisive many of the analyses of this book still are. Nowhere is this more striking than where Tocqueville discusses the distinctive political significance of the American judicial system, Du pouvoir judiciaire aux États-Unis et de son action sur la société politique (On the judicial power in the United States and its action on political society). In this chapter, Tocqueville argues that although the American judiciary conserves the traditional traits of European legal systems, it nevertheless has a political power that is unknown in Europe and distinctively characteristic of American society. What strikes the foreign observer first and foremost is how il n’y a pour ainsi dire pas d’événement politique dans lequel il n’entend pas invoquer l’autorité du juge; et il en conclut naturellement qu’aux ÉtatsUnis le juge est une des premières puissances politiques. (I, 167) 13 14 Samuel Weber there is so to speak no political event in which the authority of the judge is not invoked; and from this he concludes, naturally enough, that in the United States the judge is one of the primary political powers. What is remarkable, however, is how this politicization of the judiciary, through its judges, turns out in fact to entail rather a ‘‘judicialization’’ of the political, since the American legal system preserves the three characteristics that traditionally distinguish judicial systems elsewhere. The first of these traits is that of serving as an ‘‘arbiter’’ of disputes: Pour qu’il y ait lieu à action de la part des tribunaux, il faut qu’il y ait contestation. Pour qu’il y ait juge, il faut qu’il y ait procès. In order for the courts to become active, there must be a dispute. For there to be a judge, there must be a trial. The second trait consists in the fact that the judiciary must always address ‘‘particular cases’’ and not with general principles—not at least directly . It can confirm or undermine the power of these principles through its verdicts, but it can never ‘‘attack the general principle directly.’’ The third defining trait of the judiciary is that it can never act spontaneously, but only in response: ‘‘only when called.’’ Thus, were it to act directly as as ‘‘censeur des lois,’’ (‘‘judge of the laws’’) (169) it would overstep its defining limits. Having recalled these three traits of the judiciary, Tocqueville notes that all three are respected by the American legal system, and nevertheless, its judges have a political power that is unheard of in Europe. This power is based on the fact that unlike their European counterparts, judges in the United States interpret and apply not merely the laws of the land, but also and above all, the one, single, basic law that founds the republic, the Constitution: Les Américains ont reconnu aux juges le droit de fonder leurs arrêts sur la constitution plutôt que sur les lois. En d’autres termes, ils leur ont permis de ne point appliquer les lois qui leur paraı̂traient inconstitutionnelles. (169) Lorsqu’on invoque, devant les tribunaux des États-Unis, une loi que le juge estime contraire à la constitution, il peut donc refuser de l’appliquer. Ce pouvoir est le seul qui soit particulier au magistrat américain, mais une grande influence politique en découle. (171) The Americans have accorded judges the right to base their verdicts on the Constitution rather than on the laws. In other words, they have permitted them to not apply laws that they deem unconstitutional. 15 ‘‘God Bless America!’’ When a law that the judge deems contrary to the Constitution is invoked , he can therefore refuse to apply it. This power is the sole that is distinctive to the American judge, but it has enormous political implications. Thus, the ‘‘application’’ of a law, through the judicial system, entails a double judgment: not just that of deciding whether the (general) law applies to the particular ‘‘case,’’ but also whether that general law is consistent with the Constitution...