Blog #2- Supreme Court Video

In the video about the Supreme Court, I learned so much information that I had no clue about. I feel as though when it comes to the Supreme Court, a lot of the public is unaware of the details that goes into the highly respected job. Some facts that I learned while watching the video are:

• the court poses for a new photo whenever a new justice arrives 
• the Dred Scott decision is remembered as the courts worst self inflicted wound 
• many people would call the 14th amendment the second bill of rights
• in all of history there have just been over 100 Supreme Court justices, serving an average of 16 years

Out of all the new information that I learned, there were a couple surprising things, for example before anything that the justices have to meet for, they all shake each others hand, they practically "do their own work" and only meet with each other to discuss which cases they are going to take or to discuss the case itself, and that during the Marshall years the new court rapidly earned public respect as a co-equal branch of government. 

Many of the important take aways that I learned from this video are quotes, I think that there is a power in learning from what other people have said. 

• "Their legitimacy is in the Constitution, but their power resists on public faith in their independence and impartiality"
• "though trained in the law, they deal with human dilemmas"
• "examining a document that is 200 years old is not a disadvantage, but an advantage" 
• behind John marshals statue in today's court building are inscribed the words of his opinion in the case of Marbury v Madison
• "if the court ever stopped defending the constitution or the people ever stopped listening, the one of the treasures that keep this the freest nation in the world would cease to exist"

All in all, I think there are three most important take aways from this whole video. These are: one thing that people don't understand is that the judges can't come in in the morning and say "here's a problem lets deal with it", the way that a president, senator, or governor can do, the power of the court is the power of the trust earned, the trust of the American people, and the unspoken contract between the Supreme Court and the people is one of the hidden keys to our freedom. 

The video made me change my thoughts about the Supreme Court in a way that was more eye opening rather than changing my viewpoint. I didn't really know anything about what happens in the Court or the whole behind the scenes, so the whole video was just really eye opening.