Senate Judiciary Votes to Require Televised Supreme Court Proceedings The Senate Judiciary Committee approved, 13-6, a bill (S 446) that would require Supreme Court proceedings to be televised, but would allow exceptions if televised coverage would violate the due process rights of any party involved. The panel also approved, 13-6, a bill (S 657) that would authorize U.S. appellate and district court judges to allow electronic media coverage — including television — of court proceedings, unless coverage would violate the due process rights of any party.
I have huge questions if the Congress can REQUIRE this.
Congress can't require it, and they have no means of enforcing it. Clearly, this violates the Separation of Powers, and you can bet that the Supreme Court will rule that way if it ever comes before them.
ReplyDeleteYeah I think so too. Even the Justices that would like TV are not going to be on board with the Congress requiring it
ReplyDeleteI am intrigued by how Congress believes it would enforce such a "mandate". Does it send a letter to the Chief Justice and inform him that he is now required to place cameras in his courtroom, despite existing Supreme Court rules to the contrary? And what if the Chief Justice politely replies "No."?
ReplyDeleteDo they equip the Dept. of Justice with the power to enforce the requirement? Does the DOJ march up to the Courthouse and arrest someone for noncompliance?
What if the DOJ officials are met by a contingent of the U.S. Marshalls who work for the Court?
Does Congress and/or the Administration take the Court to court?
It'll never happen. The Court is a co-equal body of the U.S. Government and gets to decide its own procedural rules, just like the Congress gets to decide its own procedural rules.
If the COurt allowed this to happened before you know it the Congress would be mandating where they could get their law clerks!!
ReplyDeleteYeah but could they enforce it. Short of stopping the fund(which will not happen) or Impeaching the Court members that don;t want it to happenwhat can they do