The narrative of constitutional history usually takes a great leap forward from the ratification of the Constitution in 1788 to John Marshall's tenure as Chief Justice, beginning in 1801, and then treats the Supreme Court decisions of the next two decades as an updatedKutler, Stanley L...
Then, in 1802, the Republican-controlled Congress simply repealed the Judiciary Act of 1801, thus doing away with Adams’s “midnight appointees.” Still, the Federalist-dominated Supreme Court, with justices who were appointed for life and were led by the recently appointed Chief Justice John ...
Writing for the majority, Marshall held that the court could not issue a writ of mandamus compelling Madison to deliver Marbury’s commission, as Marbury had requested, because the act that authorized the court to issue such writs (the Judiciary Act of 1789) was in fact unconstitutional and ...