What the Supreme Court rules, has to be followed up on. It does not matter what the relevant parties involved think of a particular decision. That is just the way it works. The court has a moral and legal authority to pass out judgments and expect them to be followed up on. Civilisation itself is out the window once this basic scheme of things is taken lightly. Not for nothing did a wartime Winston Churchill remark, while viewing the extensive damage after the infamous Battle of Britain, that things were not all too bad if the courts were still working.
So if the courts decision regarding contract employees is not enforced, theoretically it affects all litigants in all cases across the country. The governments retention of many officials on key positions who had been superannuated and rehired on a contract basis continues despite a ruling by the apex court. This behaviour could be deemed contemptuous of court. If the government has reservations against a particular judgment, it is more than free to air them, file for a review petition even, but the decision itself has to be enforced.
The apex courts judgment should never be made irrelevant. Yes, the governments spin doctors could muse out loud why the courts dont seem to have much of a problem with the governments extensions to senior military officials like, in the most recent example, the militarys intelligence czar. They could also point out the irony inherent in the Supreme Courts own decisions about its human resource. The bureaucratic staff in the judicial machinery aside, for a SC justice to continue on an ad-hoc long after he has retired doesnt make much sense.
As long as the letter of the law is observed, the elected government has legal authority to even run the country badly. But to carry out governance effectively, the government also needs to have a moral authority. Part of that moral authority comes with winning elections, but the rest of it has to be fought for. Not just by the government but all institutions of the state. The law should be enforced, both in letter and spirit, across the board.
