This research article analyzes two decisions of the Supreme Court of Colombia, as a constitutional tribunal under the Constitution of 1886, where it defended the right to private property against expropriations ordered by decrees of state of siege enacted by the President of the Republic; although, in these decisions it avoided ruling on the limits of the executive branch under the state of siege. Thus, by means of a political history of judicial review, this article explains the strategic behavior of the Court in two different stages: the first, in its inaugural moment as a constitutional tribunal in 1912, and the second, under the military rule of General Gustavo Rojas Pinilla in 1954. Those decisions show the political role of the Court, and the interdependence between politics and law in the construction of the judicial review in Colombia.