Question concerning Marbury vs. Madison??

Question

it says in my book that it resulted by giving the supreme court judicial review, or in other words that the supreme court had the right to review acts and laws of congress and, by extension, actions of the president and if the court found that a law or act was unconstitutional that it could overrule that law/act

i thought that we already had judicial review before this case?


forgive me if this question is stupid, im actually trying to pass my class and in order to do that i need to understand everything first and i tend to ask lotssss of questions haha

Answer 1

The Supreme Court cannot arbitrarily review or adjudicate acts of the Legislature or the Executive branches of Government without being petitioned to do so.

Answer 2

Chief Justice of the United States, John Marshall, wrote the majority opinion in this case. It was his words which defined judicial review and thrust the Supreme Court into the task of deciding which laws were constitutional and which were not. He did it one declarative sentence: "All laws which are repugnant to the Constitution are null and void".
Article III of the U.S. Constitution established the Supreme Court. But, that article contains no words which allude to the concept of judicial review.