| Reid v. Covert | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Supreme Court of the United States |
||||||
| Argued May 3, 1956 Reargued February 27, 1957 Decided June 10, 1957 |
||||||
| Full case name | Reid, Superintendent, District of Columbia Jail v. Clarice Covert | |||||
| Citations | 354 U.S. 1 (more) 77 S. Ct. 1222; 1 L. Ed. 2d 1148; 1957 U.S. LEXIS 729 |
|||||
| Holding | ||||||
| The Constitution supersedes all treaties ratified by the United States Senate. The military may not try the civilian wife of a soldier under military jurisdiction. | ||||||
| Court membership | ||||||
|
||||||
| Case opinions | ||||||
| Plurality | Black, joined by Warren, Douglas, Brennan | |||||
| Concurrence | Frankfurter | |||||
| Concurrence | Harlan | |||||
| Dissent | Clark, joined by Burton | |||||
| Whittaker took no part in the consideration or decision of the case. | ||||||
| Laws applied | ||||||
| U.S. Const. Art. VI | ||||||
Reid v. Covert, 354 U.S. 1 (1957), is a landmark case in which the United States Supreme Court ruled that the Constitution supersedes international treaties ratified by the United States Senate. According to the decision, "this Court has regularly and uniformly recognized the supremacy of the Constitution over a treaty," although the case itself was with regard to an executive agreement and the treaty has never been ruled unconstitutional.
The case involved Mrs. Covert, who had been convicted by a military tribunal of murdering her husband. At the time of Mrs. Covert's alleged offense, an executive agreement was in effect between the United States and United Kingdom which permitted United States' military courts to exercise exclusive jurisdiction over offenses committed in Great Britain by American servicemen or their dependents. The Court found that "no agreement with a foreign nation can confer power on the Congress, or on any other branch of Government, which is free from the restraints of the Constitution." The Court's core holding of the case is that civilian wives of soldiers may not be tried under military jurisdiction, because the Fifth Amendment's grant for military jurisdiction, i.e. "except in cases arising in the land and naval forces" cannot sweep in the jury-trial requirement reflected in the Fifth and Sixth Amendments.
Justice Harlan's concurrence was premised on the idea that the Constitution applies overseas, unless its application was "impracticable and anomalous." In Reid, Harlan concurred with the opinion because he found that providing Fifth Amendment rights extra-territorially was in fact, impracticable and anomalous.
The case made Mrs. Covert's lawyer,
See also
References
Works related to Reid v. Covert at Wikisource- Reid v. Covert, 354 U.S. 1 (1957).
This entry is from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors (see full disclaimer)
