Sources
Help build the largest human-edited directory on the web.
Submit a site - Become an editor
Wikipedia. Licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.
Are you an expert in this subject? Join the discussion and share your knowledge at Wikipedia.org.
Reid v. Covert
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Reid v. Covert | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Supreme Court of the United States |
|||||||||
| Argued May 3, 1956 Reargued February 27, 1957 Decided June 10, 1957 |
|||||||||
|
|||||||||
| Holding | |||||||||
| The Constitution supersedes all treaties ratified by the United States Senate. | |||||||||
| Court membership | |||||||||
| Chief Justice: Earl Warren Associate Justices: Hugo Black, Felix Frankfurter, William O. Douglas, Harold Hitz Burton, Tom C. Clark, John Marshall Harlan II, William J. Brennan, Charles Evans Whittaker |
|||||||||
| Case opinions | |||||||||
| Plurality by: Black Joined by: Warren, Douglas, Brennan Concurrence by: Frankfurter Concurrence by: Harlan Dissent by: Clark Joined by: Burton Whittaker took no part in the consideration or decision of the case. |
|||||||||
| Laws applied | |||||||||
| U.S. Const. Art. VI | |||||||||
Reid v. Covert, 354 U.S. 1 (1957), is a landmark case in which the United States Supreme Court ruled that the Constitution supersedes international treaties ratified by the United States Senate. According to the decision, "this Court has regularly and uniformly recognized the supremacy of the Constitution over a treaty," although the case itself was with regard to an executive agreement and the treaty has never been ruled unconstitutional.
The case involved Mrs. Covert, who had been convicted by a military tribunal of murdering her husband. At the time of Mrs. Covert's alleged offense, an executive agreement was in effect between the United States and United Kingdom which permitted United States' military courts to exercise exclusive jurisdiction over offenses committed in Great Britain by American servicemen or their dependents. The Court found that "no agreement with a foreign nation can confer power on the Congress, or on any other branch of Government, which is free from the restraints of the Constitution." In particular, Covert's right to trial by jury had been violated, the Court found.
This article related to a U.S. Supreme Court case is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.