In Iran, moral issues are turned over to a Guardian Council of 12 members who are experts in law. The Guardian Council has the power to overturn laws approved by the Parliament. In the US, the Guardian Council, err, Supreme Court, has 9 members who are experts in law, and can overturn laws approved by the federal and state legislatures. Both bodies, moreover, interpret the law according to the moral worldview of their country’s respective elites—from which those legal experts are drawn—even when that departs from the moral worldview of the public in those countries.
The "elites" in Iran are the Shi'a hierarchy. The "elites" in the US are, in your formulation, people who went to college and who live in major US metros. These are not comparable sets. Elite control over US policy is implicit (one might even say supposed); elite control over Iranian policy is explicit and rigidly formalized. These are not comparable notions of "turned over to".