ing, functioning reality, most no tably in his opinion in Marburyv. Madison (1803). Even if we recog nize that the concept of judicial review had indeed gained accep tance well before that celebrated case, we might still be puzzled to decide what its essential purpose was meant to be. Did the framers and ratifiers of the Constitution expect that the Court's power to test the constitutionality of offi cial acts would be used primarily as a check against an overreach ing Congress or an overzealous executive? Or was judicial review designed to answer other ends? In fact, judicial review has always been much more con cerned with policing the bound aries of federalism than with maintaining the balance of power within the national government itself. Most ofthe legislative acts that the Court overturns are the work of state and local legislatures, not Congress. And here lies a great irony. For judicial review entered American constitutional theory largely as a weak and doubtful solution to the problem of preserving the supremacy of the new national government over the expected rivalry and opposition ofthe states. Over time, however, it has evolved into a powerful engine not only for keeping the national and state governments within their allotted orbits, but also for imposing crucial national norms of civil rights and liberties upon recalcitrant states. When the framers of the Constitution assembled at Phila delphia in May 1787, they were aware of a handful of cases in which state courts had already voided particular legislative acts on constitutional grounds. But the way in which the framers thought about the constitutional duties ofthe federal judiciary owed far more to two proposals to which James Madison was deeply com mitted. The first was to create a joint executive-judicial council of revi sion, armed with a limited veto over acts of Congress. The second was to give Congress a negative (or veto) on acts ofthe state legislatures. In supporting the council of revision, Madison and his ally James Wilson argued that it was better to allow judges to contribute their legal expertise to the drafting of legislation than to wait to correct the Convention at Philadelphia, 1787/' Illustration on the title page of History ofthe United States, published in 1823. (Courtesy ofthe Library of Congress, USZ62-92869.)