The Constitution is the Supreme Law of the Land, it it ranks other sources of law in order of priority. Court rulings don't even make the ranking, but many judges seem to regard them with higher priority than the Constitution itself. Any court decision which cannot be justified without citing other precedent as legitimate cannot be legitimately justified under the Constitution.
That isn't to say precedent should never be used for anything. On issues which are truly ambiguous, it is right and proper for a court to use precedent in deciding among possible outcomes. Further, there may be times when a court should rule that earlier precedent was illegitimate, but earlier reliance upon it was reasonable. In such a situation, the immediate effect would be similar to that of having found the precedent legitimate, but the direction of future changes would be steered toward real legitimacy.
Unfortunately, I've never heard of a court actually doing that. Instead, courts bend over backward to pretend that all their earlier decisions were legitimate, no matter how ridiculous the contortions required.
The Constitution is actually pretty simple. The only thing that makes it "complicated" is pretending it says all the stuff it would have to say to justify the Court's behavior. Given a choice between (1) the Constitution is such an intricate body of law with countless twists and that somehow fit with earlier Court decisions, or (2) the Court sometimes rules contrary to the Constitution, and such rulings form no part of the Supreme Law of the Land, I find (2) far more plausible, even though judges, alas, still seem convinced of #1.
The Constitution is the Supreme Law of the Land, it it ranks other sources of law in order of priority. Court rulings don’t even make the ranking, but many judges seem to regard them with higher priority than the Constitution itself. Any court decision which cannot be justified without citing other precedent as legitimate cannot be legitimately justified under the Constitution.
That isn’t to say precedent should never be used for anything. On issues which are truly ambiguous, it is right and proper for a court to use precedent in deciding among possible outcomes. Further, there may be times when a court should rule that earlier precedent was illegitimate, but earlier reliance upon it was reasonable. In such a situation, the immediate effect would be similar to that of having found the precedent legitimate, but the direction of future changes would be steered toward real legitimacy.
Unfortunately, I’ve never heard of a court actually doing that. Instead, courts bend over backward to pretend that all their earlier decisions were legitimate, no matter how ridiculous the contortions required.
The Constitution is actually pretty simple. The only thing that makes it “complicated” is pretending it says all the stuff it would have to say to justify the Court’s behavior. Given a choice between (1) the Constitution is such an intricate body of law with countless twists and that somehow fit with earlier Court decisions, or (2) the Court sometimes rules contrary to the Constitution, and such rulings form no part of the Supreme Law of the Land, I find (2) far more plausible, even though judges, alas, still seem convinced of #1.
Statutory law, administrative law (regulations) and case law (Judicial Law) fill in the blanks where the Constitution is not specific or definitive on an issue. That’s why we have a US Code of Laws and why precedent is often utilized in deciding cases.
Courts go against precedent often. That’s how new precedents are established. At the Supreme Court, any time there is a divergence of opinion on an appeal, that means the Justices are of different minds on what precedent means as applied to any particular issue. Most decisions at the Supreme Court are not unanimous meaning that there are usually various interpretations of what the law is supposed to be.
In the specific instance of Barack Obama, only one court has made a definitive ruling on his eligibility status: The Indiana Court of Appeals. They ruled in Ankeny et. al. v The Governor of Indiana. Mitch Daniels that: “based on the language of Article II, Section 1, Clause 4 and the guidance provided by [the US Supreme Court in their 1898 decision in the case of U.S. v]Wong Kim Ark, we conclude that persons born within the borders of the United States are “natural born citizens” for Article II, Section 1 purposes, regardless of the birthplace of their parents.”—
Ankeny et. al. v The Governor of Indiana, Mitch Daniels, November 12, 2009