Strict constructionist

In the United States, strict constructionism refers to a particular legal philosophy of judicial interpretation that limits or restricts judicial interpretation.

Strict construction requires a judge to apply the text only as it is written. Once the court has a clear meaning of the text, no further investigation is required. Judges—in this view—should avoid drawing inferences from a statute or constitution and focus only on the text itself. Justice Hugo Black (1886–1971) argued that the First Amendment's injunction, that Congress shall make no law (against certain civil rights), should be construed strictly: no law, thought Black, admits no exceptions. However, "strict construction" is not a synonym for textualism or originalism. Antonin Scalia, a major proponent of textualism, said that "no one ought to be" a strict constructionist.

The term often contrasts with the phrase "judicial activism", used to describe judges who seek to enact legislation through court rulings, although the two terms are not actually opposites.

"Strict constructionism" is also used in American political discourse as an umbrella term for conservative legal philosophies such as originalism and textualism, which emphasize judicial restraint and fidelity to the original meaning (or originally intended meaning) of constitutions and laws. It is frequently used even more loosely to describe any conservative judge or legal analyst. This usage is pervasive, but in some tension with the legal meaning of the term. For example, on the campaign trail in 2000, when speaking on his choices for new Supreme Court Justices, George W. Bush promised to appoint "strict constructionists in the mold of Justices Rehnquist, Scalia, and Thomas", though Thomas considers himself an originalist, and Scalia outright rejected strict construction, calling it "a degraded form of textualism", his modus operandi.

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