Worst Supreme Court Decisions

[Dave from Michigan]

what was mapp vs. ohio I've heard of that one before

[dazzleman]

I'm surprised nobody but me has mentioned Swann vs. Mecklenburg County, the activist 1971 decision that led to the abomination of forced busing.

It was a significant step toward judicial dictatorship to move from striking down deliberate segregation (in Brown vs. Board of Education, a decision with which I agree) to forcing local districts to use undemocratic means to actively force integration that was not necessarily imposed by deliberate segregation.

The results of course were a disaster to our cities, and did absolutely nothing to help the intended beneficiaries of busing.  Plus there was the long-term damage done by this act of violence against the principle of our constitution, advancing us toward the black robed dictatorship that threatens us today.

[Emsworth]

what was mapp vs. ohio I've heard of that one before

It held that evidence seized illegally is inadmissible in court.

[Ebowed]

I'm surprised nobody but me has mentioned Swann vs. Mecklenburg County, the activist 1971 decision that led to the abomination of forced busing.

Good call.  Terrible decision

[7,052,770]

Bush v Gore!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Worst decision of all time!

I believe that the decision (except for two very minor details) was absolutely correct. It's not as bad or unsound as most people seem to feel.

At my school, the principal censored everything.  Since a lot of people actually read it anyway, it would've been a good way to get out information on STD's, pregnancy, etc, also obesity, considering how we're the highest state in both teen pregnancy and obesity.  But since our principal even rejected an article on TV shows because it mentioned Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, there was no way anything that mattered would get in there.
Obviously, you can't have like answers to a test or attacks on tough teachers, but there are some subjects that parents may be uncomfortable with (for example, sex education is illegal here), and a school newspaper, with factual info written by students for students, would be a good thing.

[Emsworth]

At my school, the principal censored everything.  Since a lot of people actually read it anyway, it would've been a good way to get out information on STD's, pregnancy, etc, also obesity, considering how we're the highest state in both teen pregnancy and obesity.  But since our principal even rejected an article on TV shows because it mentioned Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, there was no way anything that mattered would get in there.
Obviously, you can't have like answers to a test or attacks on tough teachers, but there are some subjects that parents may be uncomfortable with (for example, sex education is illegal here), and a school newspaper, with factual info written by students for students, would be a good thing.

Well, it's certainly true that it would be a good thing to have a proper, factual school newspaper. That does not, however, make the Supreme Court's decision incorrect.

[Fmr. Gov. NickG]

Lochner v. New York (substantive due process)

This actually might be my vote for worst decision, but I am surprised to see it on your list.  It is basically the opposite extreme of Wickard v. Filburn, holding that states can't pass economic legislation beyond their "police powers" to protect health, safety, and public morals.  It was overturned in the 1930's.

[Emsworth]

Lochner v. New York (substantive due process)

This actually might be my vote for worst decision, but I am surprised to see it on your list.

A18 does not like the notion of substantive due process, whether it protects economic liberty or social liberty. 

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It certainly shouldn't have been. The decision was perfectly correct, and consistent with other decisions based on substantive due process.

[Fmr. Gov. NickG]

Lochner v. New York (substantive due process)

This actually might be my vote for worst decision, but I am surprised to see it on your list.

A18 does not like the notion of substantive due process, whether it protects economic liberty or social liberty. 

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It certainly shouldn't have been. The decision was perfectly correct, and consistent with other decisions based on substantive due process.

I don't usually think of the case as belonging in the category of substantive due process, if only because it long predated the notion of substantive due process.  The case was based in a 19th c. interpretation of freedom of contract, and basically said that the state couldn't prevent people from entering into whatever contracts they wanted to, unless the state's action fell into a narrow category of "police powers".  It would make all minimum wage laws, fair labor standards, anti-discrimination laws, etc., unconstitutional, even state laws.

[Emsworth]

I don't usually think of the case as belonging in the category of substantive due process, if only because it long predated the notion of substantive due process.

The notion of substantive due process -- though not necessarily by that name -- has been around since the Dred Scott case.

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It was justified on the basis of the Fourteenth Amendment's due process clause.

[Ebowed]

Also, here's another SC case I don't like (this may surprise some, as I have stated in the past that I liked it)... the recent one that outlawed the death penalty for juveniles.

I still support the ruling, but the reasoning is awful-- why should someone who is 16 or 17 not be held accountable for his actions?  I hate the double standard used by many-- including some on this board-- that the death penalty for juveniles is regressive... but it's OK in other situations.  The whole thing is barbaric.  We need to stop acting like someone can't take any responsibilty of his own because he's a minor... but of course, the death penalty should not be an option, for a minor or an adult.

So in other words, I support the small step it took towards the elimination of the death penalty... but oppose that it basically gives juveniles a free pass when compared to adults.

[MissCatholic]

Bush vs Gore - terrible decision.

There is virtual unanimity among law professors and jurists, conservative as well as liberal, who have condemned this action by the Supreme Court's conservative majority. Justice Scalia's principal justification for issuing a stay on the Florida recount resumption, permitted by the Florida Supreme Court, was that the recount would "threaten irreparable harm to petitioner (Bush) ... by casting a cloud upon what he claims to be the legitimacy of his election." Scalia assumes here that Bush has won, but it is also clear that he feared that if the recount continued, the election could go to Gore. Taking issue with this hollow opinion, judicial conservative Terrance Sandlow stated, "The balance of harms so unmistakably were on the side of Gore," and further, the stay was "an unmistakable partisan decision without any foundation in law."

When the court was finally forced to conjure a point of law in its desperate search for a reason for the stay to save the Bush presidency, the justices (probably Scalia) hit upon the argument that the Florida Supreme Court violated the Fourteenth Amendment's equal protecion clause — that Florida's voters were being treated unequally by the lack of a standard in counting ballots. The bitter irony of this decision, as Bugliosi points out, is that "the equal protection clause ... was tailor-made for blacks" after the Civil War, intended to ensure the civil rights of former slaves. In the present case, the black vote was the most likely to be negated by the court's decision to end the recount.

The reaction of most jurists to the hijacking of the Fourteenth Amendment can be encapsulated in the words of Yale law professor Akhil Reed Amar, who has said that the court "failed to cite a single case that, on its facts, comes close to supporting its analysis and result."

[Emsworth]

There is virtual unanimity among law professors and jurists, conservative as well as liberal, who have condemned this action by the Supreme Court's conservative majority. Justice Scalia's principal justification for issuing a stay on the Florida recount resumption, permitted by the Florida Supreme Court, was that the recount would "threaten irreparable harm to petitioner (Bush) ... by casting a cloud upon what he claims to be the legitimacy of his election." Scalia assumes here that Bush has won, but it is also clear that he feared that if the recount continued, the election could go to Gore.

The issuance of a stay was incorrect, but not for the reason you provide. An injunction cannot be issued to prevent irreparable harm to the petitioner, when granting the injunction can cause even greater harm to the respondent. That is why the stay was legally unsound.

But the stay was issued before the decision was handed down, and is strictly not a part of Bush v. Gore.

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That's an absurd argument. Seven out of the nine Justices agreed that the Florida law was unconstitutional. It is possible for two voters in two different counties to cast identical ballots, with identical chads, and yet have their votes counted in two different ways under the law. In this case, equal protection is denied; the Supreme Court was right that the law is unconstitutional.

[Emsworth]

Time for an update:

1. Dred Scott v. Sandford: The decision was perhaps the most egregious one that the Supreme Court has ever made. Firstly, the notion that even free blacks were not persons or citizens of the United States was ridiculous. Furthermore, the decision was the source of the substantive due process doctrine.
2. Plessy v. Ferguson: This decision completely ignored and emasculated the equal protection clause.
3. Griswold v. Connecticut: The Supreme Court invented a right to privacy, and raised it to the pantheon of constitutionally protected liberties.
4. Roe v. Wade: Although it merely followed from Griswold, it was still terrible enough (in terms of constitutional interpretation) to warrant placement as one of the worst decisions made by the Supreme Court.
5. Allgeyer v. Louisiana: The precuror to Lochner, this decision firmly established the doctrine of economic substantive due process.
6. Gonzales v. Raich: The ruling twisted the commerce clause beyond all reasonable limits.
7. Schenck v. United States: This was the first Supreme Court case dealing with freedom of speech, and the ruling (that the protections were lessened during wartime) was an atrocious one.
8. Missouri v. Jenkins: The concept of state sovereignty was totally dismantled.
9. Korematsu v. United States: The Supreme Court held that the President could order the detention of individuals in internment camps merely on the basis of race.
10. Kelo v. New London: The public use clause of the Fifth Amendment was entirely disregarded.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

3. Griswold v. Connecticut: The Supreme Court invented a right to privacy, and raised it to the pantheon of constitutionally protected liberties.

Change your avatar already.

[Emsworth]

Change your avatar already.

Constitutional interpretation does not depend on avatar color, Jfern. Earl Warren--a Republican--was firmly in favor of the so-called "right to privacy." Hugo Black--a staunch Democrat--strongly believed that no such right exists.

I have, to date, not seen one scintilla of evidence for the assertion that the Constitution protects the "right to privacy." All I hear are broad assertions that "privacy is part of the liberty protected by the Fourteenth Amendment" or that "privacy is protected by the Ninth Amendment," when it is clear to me that the Fourteenth Amendment's protections are procedural, not substantive, and that the Ninth Amendment does not apply to the states.

[jokerman]

Bush v Gore is among the worst

[The Duke]

There is virtual unanimity among law professors and jurists, conservative as well as liberal, who have condemned this action by the Supreme Court's conservative majority. Justice Scalia's principal justification for issuing a stay on the Florida recount resumption, permitted by the Florida Supreme Court, was that the recount would "threaten irreparable harm to petitioner (Bush) ... by casting a cloud upon what he claims to be the legitimacy of his election." Scalia assumes here that Bush has won, but it is also clear that he feared that if the recount continued, the election could go to Gore. Taking issue with this hollow opinion, judicial conservative Terrance Sandlow stated, "The balance of harms so unmistakably were on the side of Gore," and further, the stay was "an unmistakable partisan decision without any foundation in law."

There was no unanimity, and to suggest such is simply stupid.

The reason for the stay was simple.  If the count went forward and found Gore the winner and the methods used in that recount were found unconstitutional then irreperable harm would be done to the Bush presidency.  However, if the count were temporarily stopped and then found constitutional and then was allowed to proceed after the SC sanctioned the new count and showed Gore to win then now harm would come to Gore.

Gore coould only be "harmed" if his request was shown to be a perversion of the Constitution.

[AuH2O]

Furman v Georgia... don't know if I mentioned that on this thread or not.