Finally, Marbury exposes students to the special function and private rights views of federal jurisdiction which come in handy during the justiciability part of the course.
I remain totally unconvinced that one must (or even should) teach issues like "justiciability" in an introductory course. Why not leave them for a course on federal jurisdiction. And, as Dick Fallon points out in a brilliant U.Cal. L.Rev. essay, the Marshallian argument that "we have to do this because we have no control over our jurisdiction" doesn't survive the move to almost entirely discretionary jurisdiction. One has a choice, I believe: To teach a course on whether one can really take the enterprise of constitutional interpretation seriously or a course on the institutional role (and behavior) of the United States Supreme Court. The latter is not without value, but I think the former is far more important.
sandy
