Their authority is restricted to interpretation of situations where the meaning of federal laws or regulations is unclear. The problem is that, ultimately, pretty much any law can be challenged and appealed all the way to SCOTUS - and if they choose to take the case and issue a ruling, there's no recourse within the system. That is an immense amount of power no matter how one looks into it - it's basically a non-overridable veto on anything the government does, not even necessarily just passed legislation, and not just on the federal level (as any action by the state government can also be challenged on the grounds of being unconstitutional wrt the federal constitution).

The SC can only rule on cases that appear before them. The SC cannot just decide to rule on whatever they want.

There are 250 million adults in the country who can sue over pretty much anything. It is not exactly difficult to arrange for a convenient case to land on SCOTUS plate - indeed, it has been done several times in history.

The SC only hears a handful of cases in a year, and only those that have managed to bubble up through the lower courts. The SC does not invent cases they can then rule on.

> it's basically a non-overridable veto on anything the government does

The Legislature and Executive can pass a new law that overrides a decision that ruled on existing law.

Not if the ruling was on constitutional grounds. Well, they can pass a new law and claim that it's constitutional, of course - but it would be likely to blocked right away in the lower courts if it is in blatant contradiction with the earlier ruling, regardless of whether those courts agree with the ruling itself. Worst case, it just gets appealed all the way back to SCOTUS which strikes it down again, so it's not at all like the usual 2/3 supermajority legislative override of the executive veto.

Congress can change the Constitution.

Congress can submit an amendment for ratification. 3/4 of state legislatures would have to ratify it for constitution to actually change. But yes, you're right, that is the one and only check there is ... although even that one is weak, because no matter what the constitution actually says, the court can interpret it however it wants in practice - there's no shortage of examples.

> Despite AWFUL national and international reporting on the Supreme court, their powers are actually quite limited. Their authority is restricted to interpretation of situations where written federal laws do not already exist.

This is pretty directly refuted by Dobbs. Roe v. Wade was not ambiguous and was a settled matter of constitutional law until the new court decided they didn't like it.

> This is pretty directly refuted by Dobbs. Roe v. Wade was not ambiguous and was a settled matter of constitutional law until the new court decided they didn't like it.

I don’t like the decision here as well for political reasons, but if you read the arguments the Supreme Court is just saying that abortion law is a state issue not a federal one. Which limits the power of the federal government. Which is good.

The part where women have to register their periods and have them tracked and might get arrested if they miss a cycle, or put in jail for buying contraceptives, or for googling the wrong things, or are forced to carry a dead fetus to term - which actually happened because in some states the ban on abortion is absolute, with fifteen states not even having exceptions for rape or incest - is not good. The part where doctors are afraid to perform procedures on pregnant women for fear of committing a felony? Not good. The part where Americans don't seem to care about the actual human cost of rights being taken away as long as it weakens the federal government is not good.

Looking at how Southern states seem to be competing to out-fascist each other right now, devolving everything to states' rights seems like a bad idea. If it were entirely left up to the states, half of them would be hunting gays for sport. Having common standards as a culture enshrined in law and a central government strong enough to protect and enforce those standards also seems good. It's weird that this isn't even up for debate where gun rights are concerned but bodily autonomy, rights to privacy and free speech are all up in the air.

There is no such thing as "settled" constitutional law for the Supreme Court. They are not bound by their own precedents and always have the authority to revisit prior decisions.

I don't like the results of the Dobbs decision either. But the root cause of the problem was always legislative, not judicial. When the legislature fails to make the laws clear, anything that ends up in front of the Supreme Court is going to be a toss-up. Tell your members of Congress to do better.

Thanks, this doesn't address what I said at all. What I said is that Dobbs refutes the idea that the Supreme Court's authority is limited to "interpreting situations where federal law does not already exist". There's no question that prior to Dobbs, Roe existed, was not ambiguous, and was the legally operative interpretation of the constitution.

This comment highlights why you shouldn't get legal opinions from tech discussion sites. I don't think you demonstrated any knowledge of why the supreme court exists in practical or theoretical terms, but you are quite confident in your view.