The Supreme What?

 Ahhhh The Supreme Court. Definitely not the favorite branch of government in today's standards by any means given its been plagued with controversy after controversy since the early 1990's. The court took a steep drop off in popularity amongst the American people last summer when it overturned Roe v. Wade causing nationwide protests and calls for its abolishment. So what is the Supreme Court? The Supreme Court of the United States (also known as SCOTUS) is the highest federal court in the country and the head of the judicial branch of government. It was established by the U.S. Constitution and has the ultimate jurisdiction over all laws within the United States and is responsible for evaluating the constitutionality of those laws. The court is made up of 9 justices, but it hasn't always been like that. When the court was first established in 1790, there were a total of 6 justices. Not really an ideal number if we are considering split decisions, but it is definitely something that is not really touched on in history classes. It was a surprise to me. The most important job of the Supreme Court is its power and role of judicial review. Judicial Review  is the power of the U.S. Supreme Court to review laws from Congress, the President, or the states to determine whether they are constitutional or not. This is part of the checks and balances that the three branches of the federal government use in order to limit each other and ensure a balance of power. The most surprising thing that I recently learned about the Supreme court was actually the first case that it ever handed a verdict down on. West v. Barnes was a unremarkable case that settled a family financial dispute. And that's it. Not so crazy considering it was the first case in Supreme Court history. Other fascinating news that I have learned about the Supreme court recently was shown in a class video. The video highlighted the process of how justices choose each case that will heard by the supreme court and what is interesting is the sheer amount of cases that pass through each justices office every week, and the fact that they virtually have no help.  Justice Brandeis famously said "We do our own work" when speaking of the amount of pressure and work put on each individual at any given time when deciding court cases.