Can another court change the decision of a supreme court?

Answer 1

Unless the 'other court' is a later US Supreme Court, no. A court case in the US, once decided on by the Supreme Court, cannot be appealed to any body, so the case is decided. However, the precedent set by a US Supreme court case can be changed by a later US Supreme Court case decision, as was the case when Brown v Board of Education changed the precedent set by Plessy v Ferguson.

Answer 2

Nothing, once the Court promulgates its decision. However, the policy effect of a SCOTUS decision can theoretically be changed, at least to a certain extent.

A decision of the Supreme Court of the United States can extend to strking down all or part of Congressional legislation as contravening the Constitution. This does not stop the Congress from later enacting legislation in order to try to get its way but that does not run afoul of the Constitution based on how it believes the Court would rule. Sometimes the Court takes issue with howCongress effectuates policy legislatively but it would not necessarily disagree with the policy goal of the legislation if implemented consistent with established constitutional law. This is due to how the doctrine of stare decisis can affect future law.

Administrative rulemaking, which is decidedly constitutional, as to precisely how the executive branch executes and enforces legislation, can be done in such a way as to have the effect of changing policy--as long as it does not go so far as to cause the Court to conclude that the executive branch is not faithfully executing the laws as mandated by the Constitution. The federal executive could also point to the provisions of Amendment IX and Amendment X or the contours of the doctrine of federal preemption as limiting the extent to which it can or should implement the law. Arguing before the Court on behalf of the interests of the executive is the function of the Solicitor General of the United States.

That said, the Court will, of course, defer to the intent of Congress as its beginning standard so long as legislation does not stray into the realm of unconstitutionality, according to the standards of rational basis scrutiny, intermediate scrutiny or strict scrutiny, standards applied depending on the nature of the rights purportedly affected, on the basis of whether or not the Court considers the rights at issue to be fundamental or not.

The Constitution can also be amended in accordance with its Amending Formula. Theoretically, though, even an Amendment couldn't contravene a provision or constitutional law pertaining to a provision of the Bill of Rights. That is, it is unlikely that an Amendment stating "people don't get due process of law in these specific circumstances" or "similarly-situated persons don't get equal protection of the laws in these specific circumstances" would ever pass, again, because of stare decisis. Then again, Prohibition, enabled by Amendment XVIII, may have been a broader exercise of power than those enabled by the Commerce Clause and the Dormant Commerce Clause.

That said, the precise contours of Prohibition were implemented by the Volstead Act or the National Prohibition Act, and theoretically this Act, just as any Congressional legislation, could have been considered by the Court in the context of the Commerce Clause and the Dormant Commerce Clause, even in the context of Amendment XVIII (which itself was repealed thirteen years later by Amendment XXI). It's important to remember that the Commerce Clause and Dormant Commerce Clause pertain to specifically-granted powers of the federal and State governments, and not necessarily to the inalienable and preexisting individual rights specified in the Bill of Rights or in other Amendments, such as Amendment XIV.

There is nothing to stop the Congress from enacting a law it knows the Court would strike down, and such laws remain good law until such time as the Court rules against the law and strikes it down. An example is the federal Defense of Marriage Act, which would be essentially impossible for the Court to uphold, in the context of the doctrine of equal protection. But until the SCOTUS strikes it down (and, in due course, it no doubt will), DOMA remains good law to the extent not already stricken down by the lower federal courts.

Nevertheless, it is very possible to get around basic rights found in and derived from the Constitution. For example, the definition of, and application of, the term "enemy combatant" as affecting Americans' Constitutional rights, or the justification that prisoners at the United States Naval Station Guantanamo Bay are not subject to the usual Constitutional protections because the military base there is not located in United States territory, but instead is on foreign territory that just happens to be encumbered by a long-term lease to the United States.

Answer 3

Supreme court decisions are considered the final say in legal affairs. However, they can be and often are overturned upon subsequent reviews by congress, the court, etc.

This typically only happens after time dictates a Supreme Court Decision is no longer relevant or it could possibly be unconstitutional.