Judicial Activism and Its Critics

Authors

Kermit Roosevelt
Richard W. Garnett, Notre Dame Law SchoolFollow

Document Type

Conference Proceeding

Publication Date

2006

Publication Information

155 U. Pa. L. Rev. PENNumbra 112 (2006)

Abstract

"Judicial activism," writes Professor Kermit Roosevelt, of Penn, has been employed as an "excessive and unhelpful" charge--one "essentially empty of content." As a substitute, Roosevelt reviews here the framework for analysis of Supreme Court opinions that receives fuller treatment in his recent book, The Myth of Judicial Activism. Professor Richard W. Garnett, of Notre Dame, is willing to go along with "much, though not all, of" Roosevelt's position. Ultimately, Garnett suggests "that 'judicial activism' might be salvaged, and used as a way of identifying and criticizing decisions...that fail to demonstrate th[e] virtue" of constitutional "humility."

Comments

Reprinted with permission of University of Pennsylvania Law Review PENNumbra.

Recommended Citation

Kermit Roosevelt & Richard W. Garnett, Judicial Activism and Its Critics, 155 U. Pa. L. Rev. PENNumbra 112 (2006).
Available at: https://scholarship.law.nd.edu/law_faculty_scholarship/821