Judicial reform

The Judiciary Act of 1789 (ch. 20, 1 Stat. 73) was a United States federal statute enacted on September 24, 1789, during the first session of the First United States Congress. It established the federal judiciary of the United States.^{[6][7][8][9][10]} Article III, Section 1 of the Constitution prescribed that the "judicial power of the United States, shall be vested in one Supreme Court, and such inferior Courts" as Congress saw fit to establish. It made no provision for the composition or procedures of any of the courts, leaving this to Congress to decide.^[11]

The Judicial Procedures Reform Bill of 1937,^[12] frequently called the "court-packing plan",^[13] was a legislative initiative proposed by U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt to add more justices to the U.S. Supreme Court in order to obtain favorable rulings regarding New Deal legislation that the Court had ruled unconstitutional.^[14] The central provision of the bill would have granted the president power to appoint an additional justice to the U.S. Supreme Court, up to a maximum of six, for every member of the court over the age of 70 years.

The judicial reform of Alexander II is generally considered one of the most successful and consistent of all his reforms (along with the military reform). A completely new court system and order of legal proceedings were established. The main results were the introduction of a unified judicial system instead of a cumbersome set of estates of the realm courts, and fundamental changes in criminal trials. The latter included the establishment of the principle of equality of the parties involved, the introduction of public hearings, the jury trial, and a professional advocate that had never existed in Russia. However, there were also problems, as certain obsolete institutions were not covered by the reform. Also, the reform was hindered by extrajudicial punishment, introduced on a widespread scale during the reigns of his successors – Alexander III and Nicholas II.^[15][16][17]

The Judicial Reform Committee of South Sudan (JRC) was launched by the Government of South Sudan on 28 July 2022 to review laws, and to advise on judicial reforms and restructuring of the judiciary.^[18]

The 2023 Israeli judicial reform is a set of five changes to the judicial system and the balance of powers in Israel that was proposed in January 2023. The intent of the measures is to curb the judiciary's influence over lawmaking and public policy by limiting the Supreme Court's power to exercise judicial review, granting the government control over judicial appointments and limiting the authority of its legal advisors.^[19] The effort was led by Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Justice Yariv Levin and the Chair of the Knesset's Constitution, Law and Justice Committee, Simcha Rothman.

The 2024 Mexican judicial reform is a series of constitutional amendments that restructured the judiciary of Mexico.^[20] The reform replaced Mexico's appointment-based system for selecting judges with one where judges, pre-selected by Congress, are elected by popular vote, with each judge serving a renewable nine-year term. It reduces the number of Supreme Court justices from 11 to 9 and limits their terms to 12 years. The reform also allows the use of "faceless" judges and establishes a new tribunal for judicial oversight and accountability, while significantly reducing benefits and salaries previously received by members of the judiciary.^[21][22] With its passing, Mexico became the first country to have elections for all judges.^[23][24]

The reform was put forward by the governing coalition, led by the National Regeneration Movement (Morena), with the goal of eliminating corruption in the judiciary.^[25] It faced significant resistance from opposition political parties, judicial workers, and international organizations, who argued that it threatened judicial independence.^[26][27] It sparked nationwide protests and strikes, even leading to the storming of the Senate on the day of the bill's vote.^[28][29]

Since 2017, a series of protests against judiciary reforms have occurred in Poland. Since Law and Justice took power in Poland in 2015, its influence rapidly extended to the judicial branch, through contended nominations that produced the 2015 Polish Constitutional Court crisis. The Law and Justice party argues that the reforms are needed to improve the efficiency of the judiciary, but the opposition, supported by a significant number of members of the judiciary, has been very critical of the reforms. The reforms have also been criticized by a number of international bodies.^[30][31] The European Commission invokes the Article 7 of the European Treaty against E.U. member Poland, denouncing recent judiciary reforms putting it under the political control of the ruling majority and citing "serious risk [to] the independence of the judiciary and the separation of powers".^[32][33][34]

Recent decades have seen a surge in the birth of "supraterritorial institutions and associations",^[35] that have been gathered by their enactment of common law and practices. European Union's regional expansion into Southeastern Europe to include Romania is one such example. The community of European states has enacted treaties that have allowed them to unite politically and economically.

The reform was launched in 2014 after the Revolution of Dignity and the 2014 Ukrainian presidential election. The purpose of the reform is to bring the judiciary of Ukraine to European standards and to ensure the protection of the rights, freedoms and legitimate interests of citizens through timely, effective and fair resolution of legal disputes on the basis of the rule of law.^[38]