Until the Civil War, judicial review fell well within the perceived constraints declared by Alexander Hamilton. There was a balance of power. After Lincoln demonstrated that the Federal government (and its military might) made Hamilton's assertions on judicial power a pipe dream, the court has been used to political end ever since. Only recently has the court become so arrogant as to assert its own will and to effectively legislate from the bench.
As Jefferson astutely observed:
"The germ of destruction of our nation is in the power of the judiciary, an irresponsible body — working like gravity by night and by day, gaining a little today and a little tomorrow, and advancing its noiseless step like a thief over the field of jurisdiction, until all shall render powerless the checks of one branch over the other and will become as venal and oppressive as the government from which we separated."