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Show The judicial power ought to be distinct from both the legislative and executive, and 'independent of both, that so it may be a check upon both. Thoughts on Government (1776) by John Adams (1735-1826). Through the stormy years preceding the establishment of our Federal Constitution, the brilliant deter-mination deter-mination to maintain .a separation sep-aration of the three powers of the Federal gov-erment gov-erment was argued ar-gued to its suc-cesful suc-cesful establish-ment. establish-ment. The theory known as r- I ..; '.' t i. ; ' . .."" r.-l ' '-, 1 - ' . ' " ,V.J 'T-.f " . K ' t ment for which a lot is left to be desired. But even in these instances where the sacrifice of joining the legislative power with that of the executive, no sane person has ever thought of placing the judicial power in the hands of any but those qualified by training and experience ex-perience to sit in judgment and review of all things which of necessity require the judicial power. Not only that, but no sane person has ever thought of interfering with the judicial power to the extent of substituting substi-tuting their judgment for that of the court. Orderly government govern-ment forbids it! Of course, the legislative may change the law, and the execu. tive may attempt to administer his policy, but each of them moves under well recognized limitations, and each of them moves under the scrutiny of the judicial power. THE BUSINESS OF THE COURT IS THE COURTS BUSINESS Recently, the Salt Lake City Police and Traffic Court became be-came the scene of a situation which makes it appear that there are those who have forgotten for-gotten the brilliant idea of our founding fathers, that the judicial ju-dicial power must be independent independ-ent of both the legislative and the executive powers. The Judge works under the limitations limita-tions of the law the prosecutors prosecu-tors and the attorneys before the court work under the scrutiny of the juge. The orderly or-derly processes of government cease, and the government is degraded when the business of the court is interfered with by any power other than that which is provided for the purpose pur-pose by the law we live under. If the executive, legislative, or any other power has interfered inter-fered with the business of the courts in any manner other than with those orderly and reasonable processes which have been the mainstay of our free government, then by so much has the citizen of a free government been duped and degraded. He has been duped and degraded, because he has a right to expect more from his government officials, and his fellow citizens. Some of the charges which were being bandied about in the press and among the taxpayers tax-payers of this area concerned continuances and reductions of offences charged against certain cer-tain defendants. About these we will have more to say next week. John Bright (1811-1889). in a commentary he made in 1880 on the troubles his country (England) was having with Ireland said, 1 'FORCE IS NO REMEDY." the check and balance system, Sir. Maughan has over the past one hundred and seventy years provided the American people with thre wach-dogs. These three watchdogs, watch-dogs, the Congress, the President, Presi-dent, and the Supreme Court, have checked and balanced the powers of each other in such a way that the citizens of the United States have never been, for long, in any acute danger of losing their heritage as a free people. The fact that we haven't lost our heritage as a free people peo-ple is not solely because there exists a piece of paper which we call our Constitution, made up of seven articles and twenty-two amendments. The primary reason we maintain main-tain our free status is that we believe in the principles of our kind of government. We believe in keeping a tri-partite government, govern-ment, in keeping the legislative power in its own field, in forcing forc-ing the President to conduct himself only in accordance with the powers granted him, and in maintaining a judicial power which is not subservient to either of the other powers. This is important! THE CONSTITUTION " MAKES EVERY EFFORT TO KEEP THE COURTS INDEPENDENT INDE-PENDENT OF BOTH LEGISLATURE LEGIS-LATURE AND TID3 PRESIDENT, PRESI-DENT, AND ADMITS OF NO OTHER INTERPRETATION! STATE AND LOCAL GOVERNMENTS This idea of the three independent inde-pendent and separate branches of government has furnished the framework for the organizing organ-izing of the state, county, and municipal governments, i n most instances. Even in those instances where executive and legislative departments operate in the same sphere, operate where their actions cannot always al-ways be distinguished THE COURTS HAVE NEVER BEEN, AND SHOULD NEVER BE SUBSERVIENT TO, OR MINGLED WITH EITHER OR BOTH OF THE OTHER DEPARTMENTS DE-PARTMENTS OF GOVERNMENT. GOVERN-MENT. It Is "only in the smaller governments found in cities and counties that we find an amorphous mass wherein the executive and legislative branches- of a government move in a sort of cloudy shroud through which one can not clearly distinguish between the functions of the executive and the legislator. This, almost always, makes for a govern-, |