Reference no: EM133414214

Question: Explain these approaches and the main strengths and weaknesses for each approach:

As we discussed in this week's lecture and reading, there are competing schools of thought regarding how the Supreme Court should interpret the Constitution. The Originalist school believe that the Constitution should be treated as a permeant legal document and its original meaning adhered to as much as possible (textualism) and that any interpretation should be based on the intentions of the framers/legislators at the time of writing (originalism). The Living Constitution school argues that the Constitution should be interpreted in terms of basic fundamental American values, which allows room for interpreting the Constitution more broadly Constitution when societal norms change (think of the cruel and unusual punishment debate). For example, in the case of same-sex marriage a strictly Textualists/Originalist interpretation would argue that there is nothing in the Constitution specifically protecting the right to marriage and that the authors of the 14th amendment never meant for it to be extended to cover such cases. Therefore marriage laws should be left to states. A Living Constitution interpretation would argue that marriage is seen as a right and that the Equal Protection Clause, while not specifically meant to apply to same-sex marriage, should be interpreted as doing so since norms have changed and this is now seen as a right by many. They would also argue that this interpretation would maintain the spirit of freedom and equality that are enshrined in the constitution and the amendments.