The U.S. Federal Government At-A-Glance: A Political Science Paper

            The United States Government is divided into three branches each of which functions together to complement the other in a “check-and-balance” system. The Executive branch of government is the highest office of the US government, which constitutes the seat of the US Presidency, which is a form of aristocracy form of leadership that was practiced in some European countries at the time the “Founding Fathers” were drafting the U.S. Constitution in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. This branch of government is responsible for enforcing the laws of the country that the Legislature makes and does not have the constitution rights to make laws of its own or rather interpret laws that the legislature makes. The Judiciary branch of government is responsible for interpreting the laws and this branch also serves as an eye on the president’s actions and activities. Each branch of government in the US is a distinct organ that can function separately of the other in completing the whole.

            In the case of Medellin v. Texas, the President does not have the constitutional right to demand states to adhere to the World Court ruling. The Judiciary branch is the branch of government that must be free of external influence of the other branches of government, if it should really be impartial and “blind” in the eyes of the beholder. The President is the highest person in the government, but that does not give him the right to make laws or demand the court of what it is expected to do. The President of the United States has the legitimate and constitutional rights to make treaty with other countries about issues of international policy in the interest of the United States, but his ability to turn international treaty into laws within the borders of the United States is illegitimate and unconstitutional.

            Laws made outside of the parameters of the Unites States that is contradictory to the laws of any states of the US cannot be binding. States have the right to adopt anything they feel are right for its people and within the frameworks of the US constitution as well as the individual states, and it also avoid laws that infringes on the constitution. In the specific case involving Medellin vs. Texas in which the court in Texas ruled against Medellin for murder and also failing to announce his reliance on the Vienna Convention in which the World Court ruled that the Texas Court must review their decision of the case involving Medellin.

            The traditional court procedures in the United States must be free from the influences of international treaty that the other branches of government make.  The President does not have the right to enforce international treaties with other nations or institutions as binding on the US court to be obliged to obey said treaties as laws. According to the argument supported by most of the Justices that the obligations largely depended on the diplomatic processes of member states that signed to the Vienna Convention and did not require the court systems to enforced it. Justice Roberts furthered deliberated on the premise upon which the Founding Fathers established the court system which means that “procedures that must be followed before Federal Laws can be created under the Constitution — vesting that decision in the political branches, subject to checks and balances.” He further states that the President handing over the task of the Judiciary to determine if an international treaty becomes laws that will be binding on the country does not only portray the Judiciary branch of government the authority to interpret laws, but to also make laws which in a sense is unconstitutional and wasn’t the intent of the Framers. This would also complicate the legal systems and there will not be transparencies as each branch will soon be making, enforcing and interpreting the laws and if this situation exists, it wouldn’t be different from anarchism.

            In regards to whether the president has the power to have the judiciary branch to make international treaties binding on the US is a matter that must be determine through the legal process of law through the Congress or master-minded in the Constitution itself and that the President’s authority does not fit in that respect. The President does not have the authority or power to make international treaties a binding domestic law of the United States. If a particular treaty is proposed by the President to Congress to be considered as a domestic law of the country, the decision must stem from Congress or it must have been stated and supported by the Constitution.

Reference Story can be accessed at: http://sentencing.typepad.com/sentencing_law_and_policy/2008/03/states-win-over.html Retrieved: 03/15/2008.