Supreme Court Justice John G. Roberts, Jr., recently remarked at a public event in Buffalo, New York:
“The judiciary is a coequal branch of government, separate from the others with the authority to interpret the Constitution as law, and strike down, obviously, acts of Congress or acts of the president. Its job is to, obviously, decide cases but, in the course of that, check the excesses of Congress or the executive, and that does require a degree of independence.”
Question: Is the Supreme Court the highest authority in the United States of America?
Let the facts speak for themselves.
Fact No. 1, from the Declaration of Independence
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
Source: the Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776
Fact No. 2, from the preamble to the U.S. Constitution
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
Fact No. 3, from President Abraham Lincoln
Are the three branches of the federal government coequal? No. The President appoints all federal judges, and the Legislature approves them. A congress of the Legislature can impeach and remove a president, and can remove federal judges.
We, the People, choose our congressional representatives and presidents to carry out their constitutional duties.
Thomas Jefferson observed, “If a nation expects to be ignorant & free, in a state of civilisation, it expects what never was & never will be. The functionaries of every government have propensities to command at will the liberty & property of their constituents. There is no safe deposit for these but with the people themselves; nor can they be safe with them without information. where the press is free and every man able to read, all is safe.“
Ignorantia juris non excusat is Latin for a legal principle. It means ignorance of a law is no excuse for violating a law.
In this, the age of information, ignorance is a choice, a foolish choice, “where the press is free and every man able to read.”
John White
Rockwall, Texas
John N. White 