What is your definition of a "political" question?

Question

I notice that so many questions posted under the "Politics" section of Yahoo Q&A have absolutely nothing, in my opinion, to do with politics.

I can understand if folks post their questions mistakenly in the wrong category, but perhaps people actually think that the questions they ask are political.

What is your definition of a "political" question?

Answer 1

Political Question

An issue that the federal courts refuse to decide because it properly belongs to the decision-making authority of elected officials.

Political questions include such areas as the conduct of foreign policy, the ratification of constitutional amendments, and the organization of each state's government as defined in its own constitution. The rule preventing federal courts from deciding such cases is called the political question doctrine. Its purpose is to distinguish the role of the federal judiciary from those of the legislature and the executive, preventing the former from encroaching on either of the latter. Under the rule, courts may choose to dismiss cases even if they have jurisdiction over them. However, the rule has no precise formulation, and its development since the 1960s has sometimes been unpredictable.

The Supreme Court originated the idea of political questions in the early 1800s during its formative era. As with other judicial doctrines created by the Court, the rule is interpretive and self-imposed. It is neither a result of legislation nor a part of the U.S. Constitution, although it appears to emanate from the Constitution's separation of powers. The Court created the political question doctrine as part of the broader concept of justiciability—the issue of whether a matter is appropriate for court review. Appropriate matters are called justiciable controversies and may proceed to court. Political questions are not regarded as appropriate matters; they are not justiciable and, generally, will be dismissed. The political question doctrine will not be applied to every matter that arouses fierce public debate, as seen in the Court's rulings on abortion and affirmative action. As the history of the Supreme Court shows, the determination of whether an issue is justiciable is at its own discretion.

Chief Justice John Marshall first used the term political question in 1803 at a time when the Court sought to tread delicately between warring factions of politicians in Washington. Not until 1849 was the idea elaborated, in response to a crisis in the state of Rhode Island known as the Dorr Rebellion: a political uprising had resulted in the passage of two separate state constitutions, the declaration of martial law, and the promise of military intervention by President John Tyler. The Supreme Court was asked to settle critical constitutional questions about the nature of republican government but refused (Luther v. Borden, 48 U.S. [7 How.] 1, 12 L. Ed. 581 [1849]). Chief Justice Roger Taney instead delivered the first articulation of the doctrine: federal courts should leave certain constitutional questions to the legislative and executive branches in any matter that is "a political question to be settled by the political power."

From the mid-nineteenth century until the 1960s, the political question doctrine changed very little. Then the Supreme Court began to narrow it: where previously a broad rule applied, now matters that would have been rejected as political questions became justiciable controversies. In a landmark case in 1962, the Court intervened to allow a challenge to the way in which the Tennessee legislature apportioned its voting districts (Baker v. Carr, 369 U.S. 186, 82 S. Ct. 691, 7 L. Ed. 2d 663). Again, in 1969, the Court took up a matter that previously would have been dismissed. This was its decision that the House of Representatives could not exclude a duly elected member who met all constitutional qualifications, despite the provision in Article I of the Constitution that gives both houses of Congress the power to judge qualifications (Powell v. McCormack, 395 U.S. 486, 89 S. Ct. 1944, 23 L. Ed. 2d 491).

These cases cast doubt on the future of the doctrine. In 1974, the Court added further uncertainty when it ruled against President Richard M. Nixon's claim of executive privilege in the Watergate scandal (United States v. Nixon, 418 U.S. 683, 94 S. Ct. 3090, 41 L. Ed. 2d 1039). It is well settled that the federal courts cannot supervise or control the decisions of the president or other executive official. President Nixon had relied on this fact when he defied congressional subpoenas asking him to release tapes and documents made in the White House. However, the Court chose not to rigidly adhere to the rule: it held that the demands of a fair trial and criminal justice outweighed the president's claim.

Answer 2

Political Question Definition

Answer 3

Any question dealing with an issue in running or planning for a group of people is a political question. It does not have to be at the country level.

The discussion of the possible stratagies and outcomes in Iraq would be a political question "George is the anti-christ" or "Liberals are loonies" is not.

-Dio

Answer 4

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RE:
What is your definition of a "political" question?
I notice that so many questions posted under the "Politics" section of Yahoo Q&A have absolutely nothing, in my opinion, to do with politics.

I can understand if folks post their questions mistakenly in the wrong category, but perhaps people actually think that the questions they ask...

Answer 5

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I think they mean the biblical definition "Marriage is a contract by which a man sells his daughter to another man" People who want to "stick to the definition of marriage" are people who do not realize that as a society we do not live our lives in accordance to the dictionary. Rather, the dictionary changes to suit how we use the language in our lives. If you don't want to change "Marriage" then I guess you can't use any of the words that have been added to the dictionary since the one you're using to define marriage. So much for using "internet" "google" "woot" "computer" "plasma" etc etc etc.

Answer 6

you are referring to the fact that most of the 'questions' are just flames and rhetoric.
Questions that arent questions they are just statements with a ? at the end of them.

Answer 7

Anything that has to do with how this or any other country is run.