Editorial
Chief Justice Muhammad Munir is often remembered for his infamous judgment in The State v Dosso, which laid the legal foundation for military takeovers in Pakistan. But Dosso was not a one-off error — it was the logical end of a long pattern of judicial deference to executive power.
Unlike U.S. Chief Justice Roger Taney, whose flawed judgment in the Dred Scott case stained an otherwise respected career, Munir consistently undermined judicial independence. From his tenure as Chief Justice of the Lahore High Court in 1949, Munir’s rulings reflected a tendency to legitimize executive overreach, especially in cases curbing civil liberties like Faiz Ahmed Faiz v The Crown and Maududi v Government of Punjab.
His ambitions were as political as they were judicial. Munir actively maneuvered his way to the top of the Federal Court, bypassing four senior judges with the help of then-Governor General Ghulam Muhammad. He manipulated the judicial bench to ensure favorable outcomes, as seen in the Maulvi Tamizuddin case — a ruling that fatally undermined Pakistan’s first Constituent Assembly and emboldened authoritarianism.
The Dosso judgment, where Munir applied Hans Kelsen’s theory of revolutionary legality to validate Pakistan’s first military coup, was the final blow. Even Kelsen himself criticized such use of his theory, arguing that legal validation of a coup lies outside the realm of jurisprudence and within political judgment.
Munir’s legacy isn’t a single catastrophic ruling — it’s a history of turning the judiciary into a handmaiden of the executive. His infamous question — “Who will enforce the writs?” — wasn’t one of helplessness, but a justification for surrender. His actions not only damaged the judiciary’s integrity but also set Pakistan on a path where the law bowed to power, not justice.
