I see in the news all the time so and so judge blocks this bill? How does one judge hold that much power?
In: 7
I’m assuming you mean America.
And they do and they don’t. Yes a judge can say “I’m not applying that law.” Or more commonly “That’s not how *I interpret* that law.”
Well typically when this happens it’s at the state level. Each state has a certain number of districts with a certain number of judges. This is 99% of judges. The majority of minor decision making. Each state decides how many districts and judges it has, although most like to do it by county/parish. And that is annoying to keep track of. So just know that the state level is the lowest level. If a judge there makes a questionable decision it can be appealed. In this situation it now becomes a federal issue. And goes to the court of appeals.
There are 94 appellate courts in the USA. they’re like the lowest level of federal court. And exist pretty much solely to deal with issues in state courts. If the appellate judge agrees the state judges decision was iffy, they can take the case or reject it and reaffirm the decision of the previous judge. Sometimes you get goofy stuff like they agree with the decision but not the why so they retread the same case to be careful about *how* they set case precedent. But that’s a whole other issue.
If the appellate court comes to a weird answer it can be appealed again, this time to a circuit court. Of which there are 13. This is about as high a judge can rise without being buddy buddy with the president, and the untimely demise of a supreme court justice. Anyway these guys are *almost* the law of the land. And it’s pretty rare cases get to them. If they do it’s either a seriously messed up situation, or some poor logic and decision making by colleagues lower on the totem pole. If they overturn a decision it’s pretty hard to enforce those laws in those situations.
Finally there’s the supreme court. It’s very rare cases get to them. They are hand picked by the president whenever there’s a vacancy. They serve for life and cannot be removed from office. Ultimately they are beholden to no one. And that’s the point. They can make decisions without it impacting their future career, because they’ve already gone as far as they can in their career. There is no next step you need to please people to make. So they’re meant to be decisive and not always popular. They decide how laws are interpreted and enforced.
Anytime a court makes a ruling (technically anytime although you’ll find conflicting rulings among state level rulings, so this mostly applies to appellate and higher) that sets “case precedent” meaning the issue has been decided. Say an appelate judge says “you’re *not* going to be punished for selling weed” it would be insane for any state judge to oppose that. The precedent has been set by a higher court. So selling weed would effectively become legal, even if it’s not legal by law. This is technically what’s been going on with Roe V Wade the last 40 years. Abortion has no federal legal status in the USA. It’s not legal. It’s not illegal. The federal government is fine leaving that issue to each state. However Roe V Wade went to the supreme court. Meaning the case precedent applied to the whole country. And it was decided. Women have the right to an abortion. But no one ever bothered to make it law. So when the supreme court became dominantly the *other* side of the political spectrum they were free to overturn their own prior ruling. So now it’s back to each state deciding their own rules on the subject. I haven’t heard of any cases yet, but I expect we’ll see some appellate and circuit rulings on the topic in the next few years.
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