Recently in Mississippi the governor attempted to place a special election for the senate at the bottom of the ballot. The democrats who believed this would hurt their chances in the election decided to sue. The circuit court sided with the democrats and ordered the governor to put the race at the top.
The governor appealed and the case went to the supreme court. The state supreme court ruled on the case with an 8 - 1 decision that the election by law should be at the top of the ballot. However, they also ruled the circuit court was wrong when it ordered the governor to put the race at the top stating the judicial branch has no power to force the executive branch to comply with a law and only the power to punish them if they break the law.
The single dissenting opinion was over the power of the court to force the executive branch to comply with the law. The dissenter said the court does have power to compel the executive branch to abide by the law.
Putting the politics of this specific case aside do you think the courts should be able to enforce the law on the executive branch?
I want to ask people not to consider this question in the context of the republicans vs democrats or in any other political manner. But simply do the courts have the power to prevent a law from being broken or only to punish once the law has been broken.
Hopefully we can have a discussion without the political talking points.
-----Added 18/9/2008 at 07 : 02 : 01-----
Here is a link to the ruling:
http://images.dailykos.com/images/us...rger_order.pdf