Article VI, paragraph 2 of the United States Constitution, often called the Supremacy Clause, states that "all treaties made or to be made under the authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of the land; and the judges of every State shall be bound thereby, anything in the Constitution or laws of any State to the contrary notwithstanding. On its face, the Supremacy Clause appears to clarify that treaties are always self-executing, that is, they are incorporated into U.S. law immediately upon signing and ratification. However, the relationship between non-domestic law – treaties, foreign laws, and judgments of international courts – and the American legal system is more nuanced than it seems. From Foster in 1829 to Medellin in 2008, Supreme Court cases have shaped the application of non-domestic law in the American legal system, cementing the presumed self-enforcing nature of treaties and the role of foreign law in legal cases while by limiting binding authority. judgments of international courts. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”?Get the original essay Forty-one years after the ratification of the Constitution, the self-enforcing nature of the treaties has been questioned in the case of Foster v. Neilson, a case that revolved around the ownership of a disputed parcel of land in Louisiana. In attempting to determine original ownership of the land, the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) reviewed the 1819 Adams-Onis Treaty between Spain and the United States because the eighth article of the treaty specified that "all land grants…shall be ratified and confirmed,” the Court concluded that the treaty was inherently unenforceable and invalid without a subsequent act of Congress. However, the Court emphasized that the non-self-executing nature of the Adams-Onis Treaty derived only from the “ratified and confirmed” clause of its eighth article; treaties in general were always considered directly enforceable unless otherwise specified in the treaty text. The majority wrote: “[Treaties are] considered by the courts to be equivalent to an act of legislative power… But when the terms of the stipulation imply a contract, when one of the parties undertakes to perform a particular act… the legislature must enforce the contract before it can become a rule for the Court. In addition to defining self-executing treaties as equal in authority to acts of Congress, the Court also set precedent for certain treaties, as well as other sources of international law, to be recognized as non-self-executing. Even after SCOTUS clarified that treaties could be self-executing or not, the relationships between treaties and the Constitution, federal laws, and state laws remained ambiguous. In 1920, the relationship between a treaty and state law was called into question in the case of Missouri v. Holland, in which the state of Missouri objected to the constitutionality of a treaty between the United States and Great Britain that regulated the "killing, capture, or sale" of "migrants." birds” and was in conflict with state law. Previously, the district court ruled against an earlier federal law regulating the killing of migratory birds. In this case, however, the Court decided that "a treaty may exceed [state] power" – which is why the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918, a federal law that implemented the treaty, overstepped the Missouri state law regarding migratory birds. As the majority opinion explains: “Under Article VI [of theConstitution], treaties made under the authority of the United States, and the Constitution and the laws of the United States adopted thereunder, are declared the supreme law of the land. » After establishing the supremacy of treaties over state law, the Court further clarified the relationship between treaties, federal laws, and the Constitution in 1957 in Reid v. Executive agreements in force between the United States and Great Britain and between the United States and Japan "permitted United States military courts to exercise exclusive jurisdiction over offenses committed...by United States military personnel or their dependents ". However, after being convicted of murder by foreign military courts, two military spouses alleged that U.S. treaties could not override the constitutional protections of the Fifth and Sixth Amendments. Ultimately, the Court agreed, holding that "no agreement with any foreign nation can vest any power in Congress or any other branch of government, which is free from the constraints of the Constitution." Furthermore, the Court established what is now called the last-in-time rule: "An act of Congress...is fully equal to a treaty...when a later law in time is inconsistent with a treaty, the law the extent of the conflict renders the treaty void. Because federal laws must “comply with the Constitution” and treaties are on equal footing with federal laws, treaties must therefore also conform to the Constitution. Unlike treaties, foreign law is not one of the four sources of international law explicitly listed in the Constitution. Article 38 of the Statute of the International Court of Justice. So the Supreme Court took an interesting turn in 2003, when it cited foreign law in favor of its own precedents. Lawrence v. Texas analyzed a Texas sodomy law that criminalized homosexual activity. The majority not only openly overturned Bowers, who had upheld the constitutionality of a Georgia sodomy law prohibiting oral and anal sex, but also cited laws from the British Parliament and other legislative bodies, as well as a European Court of Human Rights case that was decided five years before Bowers. The Court's controversial deference to foreign law was unprecedented, given that previous decisions referred to foreign law only in footnotes, or perhaps in dissents or concurrences. Moreover, the Court's citations of foreign law do not seem particularly necessary; rather, by “voluntarily adopting international law as persuasive authority,” the Court seemed eager to “convey a poignant message to critics—who view the Supreme Court as insular—that the trend toward globalization does not stop at the steps of the Supreme Court,” as Janet said. Koven Levit, JD, pointed this out. Although SCOTUS definitely set precedent by using foreign law as the basis for the Court's decision in Lawrence, it limited the authority of international jurisprudence in a case decided only five years later. Medellín v. Texas returned to the issue of self-enforcing and non-self-enforcing sources of international law, this time with regard to judgments of the International Court of Justice (ICJ). Medellin was a Mexican national who unsuccessfully appealed his conviction on the grounds that Texas authorities had failed to inform him of his right to contact the Mexican consulate as required by the Vienna Convention. However, the International Court of Justice also ruled that Medellin, as well as.”