Professor Robert Lipkin addressed members of the faculty and staff on the subject of judicial activism on Monday February 11th. The engaging talk sparked a number of questions from the audience that lead to interesting debates.
The talk opened with an examination of the two major kinds of judicial activism, interpretive activism and institutional activism. Interpretive activism would include; infidelity to relevant texts, history, or already in place structures, failure to defer to previous precedent, or a maximalist interpretation in which the court broadens the scope of the question with personal or political theories rather than maintaining a narrow focus. Institutional activism on the other hand focuses on the activism that can arise out of the decisions of state legislatures, Congress, and other such institutions. Both interpretive activism and institutional activism can lead to the partisan activism that leads to judicial decisions being made along political lines.