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For 80 years it has been the practice that the Senate has not confirmed any nomination made during an election year, and we shouldn’t make an exception now.8

Biden — and this is not something we’ve said very often — was absolutely correct.10 It’s a political cauldron to avoid.11 There should be no hearings. There should be no confirmation.12 Not during a presidential election year, with millions of votes having been cast in highly charged contests.13

This year is a tremendous opportunity for our country to have a sincere and honest debate about the role of the Supreme Court in our constitutional system of government.19

The Supreme Court seat doesn’t belong to any president or any political party.24

Our view is this: Give the people a voice.30

First, let's be clear that the Court could and likely will decide the SB8 case without saying anything about the continuing vitality of the abortion right. That's easy to see if a majority holds on procedural grounds that neither the U.S. nor the abortion providers (in the companion case) can bring suit for injunctive relief. If the federal court plaintiffs lack standing or a cause of action, or if the Court holds that state court judges are not proper party-defendants, or that for injunctive relief to be effective it must--but is not permitted to--run against private non-parties, then the Texas law will remain in effect pending resolution in state court and a possible eventual return to the US Supreme Court posing the question whether a six-week ban is permissible on the merits.

For the U.S. and/or the abortion providers to win, at least one of the Justices who might vote to overrule Roe v. Wade in Dobbs would need to nonetheless allow a challenge to SB8 to go forward. Why would they do so? Perhaps they'll see the case in purely procedural terms. If the stakes were lower, it would be relatively easy to imagine any Justice thinking Case X is ripe for overruling but until we overrule it, state legislatures must abide by it.

Let's assume for the sake of argument that that happens--say that next month the Court rules 5-4 that the Fifth Circuit was wrong to lift the preliminary injunction in the DOJ case. Then suppose that a different 5-4 majority or a 6-3 majority rules in late June that the Mississippi law is constitutional but that they're not deciding whether to overrule Roe (even though they would have de facto overruled much of Roe). At that point the news coverage would indeed likely be muddled. Is there still a constitutional right to abortion? When? Where? Pro-choice activists might have a harder time mobilizing voters based on Dobbs if there is also floating around the notion that the Supreme Court had invalidated the Texas law just a few months before--even though that would have been only a procedural holding.

(2) Quite apart from the substance, the procedural grounds for reinstating the injunction are strong. I acknowledge that there are genuine questions of standing, causes of action, remedy, proper defendants, and more, but the bottom line for me is fairly straightforward: As I argue in the column, the case fundamentally presents a question whether states and other government actors can use trickery to evade their constitutional obligations. Tax law has a substance-over-form principle that should be universal. Texas has made no secret of the fact that it crafted SB8's trapdoors with the clear purpose of preventing lawsuits and thus chilling the exercise of a constitutional right. Permitting this kind of evasion and defiance will invite more.

the Constitution does not establish it.

“the people will have ceased to be their own rulers.”

It also depends on whether future presidents and Congresses choose to accept judicial supremacy.

The Republican Party, despite having lost the popular vote in six of the last seven presidential elections, may use the judiciary to dictate policy on climate change, voting rights, economic inequality and more, for decades to come.

Democrats could also pass a law restricting the court from reviewing some areas of the law — a power that the Constitution explicitly gives Congress.

On the other hand, the acceptance of judicial supremacy brings big downsides, as well. It may be tantamount to forfeiting political power for the majority of Americans.

“If protecting the right of the people to govern for themselves means curbing judicial power and the Supreme Court’s claim to judicial supremacy, then Democrats should act without hesitation,”

the right to abortion cannot be a constitutional right because states restricted abortion in 1868 at the time of the ratification of the 14th Amendment. Mississippi argues that the public in 1868 would have understood the 14th Amendment to permit state restrictions on abortion to continue.

This is not a new argument—it formed the basis of then-Justice William Rehnquist’s dissent in Roe and was made repeatedly by Justice Antonin Scalia over the course of his career on the bench, including in his dissent in Casey

Chief Justice John Roberts recognized in his confirmation testimony, it is “completely circular,” using state practice to interpret the constraints the 14th Amendment was written to impose on the states.

destabilize a central part of the court’s jurisprudence protecting fundamental constitutional rights. As a result, Dobbs also threatens the fundamental rights to use birth control, marry a loved one, and make decisions about sexual intimacy.

For good reason, state practice in 1868 has never been a measure of what fundamental, personal rights are guaranteed against state infringement by the 14th Amendment. This is illustrated not only by Roe and Casey—which explicitly rejected the idea that the state practice in 1868 fixes the fundamental rights for all future generations—but also by many other landmark Supreme Court rulings vindicating the 14th Amendment’s promise of liberty for all.

In 1965, in Griswold v. Connecticut, the Supreme Court struck down a restriction on the use of birth control dating back to 1879, holding that it infringed on the right of a married couple to choose whether to start a family and bear children.

In 2003, in Lawrence v. Texas, the Supreme Court held that the 14th Amendment protected a right to sexual intimacy by LGBTQ adults, despite a very long history of laws that prohibited same-sex intimacy and sexual conduct. In Obergefell v. Hodges in 2015, the Supreme Court held that the 14th Amendment guaranteed the right to marry a loved one of the same sex, even though marriage had historically been limited to a union of a man and a woman. Both decisions drew on Loving to safeguard bedrock rights to love, marry, and form a family, ensuring equal dignity to LGBTQ persons.

If the fundamental rights protected by the 14th Amendment are determined by looking to state practice in 1868—as Mississippi and its allies urge—Loving’s holding protecting the right to marry as a fundamental right would be in doubt, as would many other landmark precedents, including Lawrence and Obergefell.

It explicitly rejects Loving’s reasoning, arguing that the Supreme Court was wrong to recognize a fundamental right to marry in that case. It claims that Lawrence and Obergefell are “lawless” rulings and urges the Supreme Court in Dobbs to leave “those decisions hanging by a thread.”

A New York City law regulated where licensed handgun owners can take a locked and unloaded handgun, but it was changed before the court would rule after supporters of gun regulations feared the justices would take an idiosyncratic state law and use it as a vehicle to expand upon Heller. But conservative justices were clearly unhappy with how lower courts were deciding Second Amendment cases.

Five of the 10 cases the court is looking at ask justices to determine whether the Second Amendment allows the government to restrict the ability of citizens to carry a firearm outside the home to those with "good cause" or "justifiable need" to do so.

The law "effectively bars ordinary, law-abiding citizens from carrying handguns outside the home for self-defense," Paul Clement, a lawyer for Rogers, said in court papers. Clement is a former solicitor general under President George W. Bush.

In court papers, New Jersey said it has not "banned carrying a firearm in public; instead, the State has carefully limited public carrying to those individuals with a need to do so."

We hope the court will consider the issue of carry outside the home, as the lower courts have ignored existing Supreme Court precedent regarding the right to bear arms," said the NRA's Amy Hunter.

The plaintiffs in the Massachusetts case, including two firearm dealers and the Gun Owners' Action League, claim that the law is contrary to the decision in Heller, in which Justice Antonin Scalia wrote that Washington, DC's ban on handgun possession in the home "violates the Second Amendment."

Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey said the state's ban is on "weapons with distinct military origins that are used disproportionately in mass public shootings and killings of law enforcement officers."

The court also previously declined to weigh in on challenge to a Chicago suburb's ban on semiautomatic firearms with the capacity to accept more than 10 rounds of ammunition in 2015.

Kavanaugh testified at his Senate confirmation hearing in 2018 that he based his opinion on the Heller decision. "This is all about precedent for me," he said and noted that Scalia had said that dangerous and unusual weapons could be prohibited. Kavanaugh said it's "very important to recognize under the Heller decision that machine guns can be prohibited" but he continued that the ban at issue "seemed to fit common use and not being a dangerous and unusual weapon."

one case challenges the federal ban on out-of-state handgun purchases. The plaintiff, Frederic Russell Mance, Jr. attempted to sell handguns to Tracey and Andrew Hanson, who were residents of the District of Columbia, in Texas. However, federal law generally makes it illegal for a licensed firearms dealer to sell any firearm to a person who does not reside in the same state.

Pena v. Horan concerns California's Unsafe Handgun Act, requiring new models of semiautomatic handguns manufactured or sold in the state to include certain safety features.

"When the court will take another gun case, what it will be, and what the court will decide is all guesswork," said Jonathan Lowy, chief counsel and vice president of pro-gun safety organization Brady: United Against Gun Violence. "They could grant cert in these cases as soon this week, or soon after, and we will be ready to ensure that Americans' right to life is not infringed upon by the gun industry."

"The bottom line is that is that the American public overwhelming supports gun safety laws and what we've seen over the last two years in statehouses across the country lawmakers are responding to that," he said. "So the gun lobby is looking to the courts."

There are five weeks to go until Election Day, but almost a million ballots have already been cast in this election, according to Michael McDonald, a turnout expert at the University of Florida who runs the U.S. Election Project, which tracks voting. That’s up from less than 10,000 early votes cast at this time four years ago.

President Trump has baselessly claimed that widespread voter fraud is rampant in both in-person and mail voting systems, without providing any evidence. His challenger, former Vice President Joe Biden, has accused Trump of eroding confidence in U.S. democracy, and has stoked fears about whether Trump will actually leave office if voted out.

There are five weeks to go until Election Day, but almost a million ballots have already been cast in this election, according to Michael McDonald, a turnout expert at the University of Florida who runs the U.S. Election Project, which tracks voting. That’s up from less than 10,000 early votes cast at this time four years ago.

“We don’t expect Chris or our other moderators to be fact-checkers.”

of the election, a subject on which the two candidates have divergent views. President Trump has baselessly claimed that widespread voter fraud is rampant in both in-person and mail voting systems, without providing any evidence. His challenger, former Vice President Joe Biden, has accused Trump of eroding confidence in U.S. democracy, and has stoked fears about whether Trump will actually leave office if voted out.

President Trump has baselessly claimed that widespread voter fraud is rampant in both in-person and mail voting systems, without providing any evidence. His challenger, former Vice President Joe Biden, has accused Trump of eroding confidence in U.S. democracy, and has stoked fears about whether Trump will actually leave office if voted out.

President Trump has baselessly claimed that widespread voter fraud is rampant in both in-person and mail voting systems, without providing any evidence. His challenger, former Vice President Joe Biden, has accused Trump of eroding confidence in U.S. democracy, and has stoked fears about whether Trump will actually leave office if voted out.

There are five weeks to go until Election Day, but almost a million ballots have already been cast in this election, according to Michael McDonald, a turnout expert at the University of Florida who runs the U.S. Election Project, which tracks voting. That’s up from less than 10,000 early votes cast at this time four years ago.

“We don’t expect Chris or our other moderators to be fact-checkers.”

Trump’s and Biden’s records The Supreme Court: This issue has gained new importance with the announcement of Trump’s nominee to replace Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. COVID-19: Daily cases are on the rise in nearly half of U.S. states. The economy: Expect this to be closely tied to the pandemic. Race and violence in U.S. cities: The framing of this topic has drawn criticism, but protests against racism and police brutality are ongoing around the country. The integrity of the election: See the latest on election security from NPR here.

Trump’s and Biden’s records The Supreme Court: This issue has gained new importance with the announcement of Trump’s nominee to replace Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. COVID-19: Daily cases are on the rise in nearly half of U.S. states. The economy: Expect this to be closely tied to the pandemic. Race and violence in U.S. cities: The framing of this topic has drawn criticism, but protests against racism and police brutality are ongoing around the country. The integrity of the election: See the latest on election security from NPR here.

Biden’s 2019 tax return shows taxable income of $944,737 and a federal tax bill of $299,346. Harris and her husband, Doug Emhoff, reported $3,018,127 in taxable income and paid $1,185,628 in taxes.

Biden’s 2019 tax return shows taxable income of $944,737 and a federal tax bill of $299,346. Harris and her husband, Doug Emhoff, reported $3,018,127 in taxable income and paid $1,185,628 in tax

Biden’s 2019 tax return shows taxable income of $944,737 and a federal tax bill of $299,346. Harris and her husband, Doug Emhoff, reported $3,018,127 in taxable income and paid $1,185,628 in taxes.

The New York Times reports that Trump’s tax returns show millions of dollars in losses and that Trump paid only $750 in income taxes in each of 2016 and 2017, and in 10 of the last 15 years paid no income tax at all. The report also raised questions about questionable tax deductions made by Trump that could run afoul of tax law.

The New York Times reports that Trump’s tax returns show millions of dollars in losses and that Trump paid only $750 in income taxes in each of 2016 and 2017, and in 10 of the last 15 years paid no income tax at all. The report also raised questions about questionable tax deductions made by Trump that could run afoul of tax law.

almost a million ballots have already been cast in this election, according to Michael McDonald, a turnout expert at the University of Florida who runs the U.S. Election Project, which tracks voting. That’s up from less than 10,000 early votes cast at this time four years ago.

There are five weeks to go until Election Day, but almost a million ballots have already been cast in this election, according to Michael McDonald, a turnout expert at the University of Florida who runs the U.S. Election Project, which tracks voting. That’s up from less than 10,000 early votes cast at this time four years ago.

and he refused.

Wednesday was like no day I can recall in the history of the court, opening as it did with a “joint statement” released by Gorsuch and Sotomayor in which the two announced that the “reporting that Justice Sotomayor asked Justice Gorsuch to wear a mask surprised us. It is false. While we may sometimes disagree about the law, we are warm colleagues and friends.”

“I did not request Justice Gorsuch or any other Justice to wear a mask on the bench,” and further affirmed that Roberts would have no additional comment. In other words, everyone has clarified that Gorsuch refuses to mask, that Sotomayor cannot come to court, and that nobody has asked him to do otherwise, but also that there is nothing to see here, kindly move along.

as NPR stands behind its story, conservatives claim that NPR is lying, and liberals claim that the issue isn’t who said what, so much as one justice refusing to make the workplace safe for a colleague.

whether Gorsuch is a monster or a libertarian hero is kind of unknowable without more information and also kind of irrelevant. I just wanted the court to tell us what their public health rules were, and when, and if the justices declined to abide by their own rules, to explain why.

Mike Davis—a minor player in the push to confirm Donald Trump’s judges and, more importantly, a former clerk and current friend of Gorsuch. Davis criticized the NPR story on Fox News on Wednesday. He was quick to condemn Ruth Marcus at the Washington Post and Nina Totenberg at NPR for, he claimed, intentionally spreading misinformation to smear Gorsuch.

The Supreme Court spent a bunch of money to upgrade the air filtration system, and for months, all nine Justices sat through these oral arguments, eight of them without masks. It was not an issue. Justice Sotomayor wore a mask, the other eight didn’t. And so two Fridays ago for some reason, the science somehow changed for the two COVID [mandate] cases, and Gorsuch didn’t want to play along with that. He wasn’t going to play politics. So he continued to do what he did for the prior months and not wear his mask.

Gorsuch believes that to wear a mask in January if you were not wearing one in November is to “play politics,” rather to respond directly to the evolving situation that is the coronavirus pandemic. Which means, one must also infer, that Justices like Sam Alito and Clarence Thomas are “playing politics” by wearing masks now when they didn’t do so before. This is deeply strange not just because it denies that “the science changed” around omicron (it did). It’s deeply strange in that he expressly links the change in the court’s masking policy to the public oral arguments in the vaccine-or-test cases, suggesting that the two are somehow related, rather than simply coinciding in time.

His argument, ostensibly on behalf of Gorsuch—that the decision of justices to don masks this month is all gratuitous virtue signaling about an imaginary spike in a pandemic that coincides with oral arguments on the topic—is actually one of the most damning things I’ve read all week. He isn’t saying Gorsuch wants to infect his colleague. He seems to be saying that, the science notwithstanding, masks don’t make a lick of difference and everyone aside from himself is buckling to the creeping evil of the Fauci state.

Imagine if everyone had simply put on a mask for a few weeks, not because the science was perfect, but out of respect for a colleague they loudly claim to adore.

Gorsuch still isn’t wearing a mask, and Sotomayor is still phoning in from the safety of her chambers. Call it “playing politics,” but in another time, demonstrating out of an abundance of caution some regard for your colleagues’ health—without being asked—would have merely been “leadership,” or “empathy,” or even “humility.”  That other time is long gone. We are all of us scorpions in a bottle now.

“I agree that we would prevail under Babcock,” Mr. Thompson replied, “but I don’t think that question is fairly presented by this case.”

“What if California had a regulation that permitted union organizers to go onto the property of your clients one hour a day, one day a year. Is that a taking subject to the per se rule?”Yes, the lawyer replied.

who may be giving Justice Elena Kagan a run for her money in the department of well-designed hypothetical questions — surely knew.

Until that decision, the court had limited the definition of a categorical taking to a physical occupation of private property, eminent domain being the prime example. Government actions that didn’t “take” private property in the literal sense, but simply limited its use in certain ways, were regarded as “regulatory takings,”

The case left the court sharply divided. It was decided on the final day of the term in 2001 with six separate opinions.

That was the war that resumed at the Supreme Court this week, and that history explains why, from the Pacific Legal Foundation’s point of view, anything short of total victory is beside the point.

This case is not only a test for the court. It is also a test for those who see the court as now populated with their ideological allies. What demands does one make of one’s friends?

If I had to predict the outcome, I think the court’s eventual decision will send the Cedar Point Nursery case back to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit with instructions to evaluate the California law as a regulatory rather than a categorical taking.

The justices once again did not act on a high-profile petition from the state of Mississippi asking the court to review the constitutionality of a state law that bans virtually all abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy. Lower courts struck down the law.

Obama relied on the Antiquities Act of 1906, which allows the president to declare national monuments on “land owned or controlled by the federal government.” The designation resulted in a ban on most commercial fishing, prompting a group of commercial-fishing associations to go to court, where they argued that the designation as a monument went beyond Obama’s power under the Antiquities Act because submerged land in the ocean is not land “controlled” by the federal government.

. Sotomayor stressed that Longoria’s case “implicates an important and longstanding split among the Courts of Appeals over the proper interpretation of” the commentary, with most circuits concluding that “a suppression hearing is not a valid basis for denying the reduction.”

The Sixth Amendment guarantees “the right to a speedy and public trial.” In Smith v. Titus, the Supreme Court on Monday turned down the case of a Minnesota man who was convicted of murder for the shooting deaths of two people who had broken into his home.

Smith argued that the decision to close the courtroom violated his rights under the Sixth Amendment. The Minnesota Supreme Court rejected that argument, and federal courts turned down Smith’s requests for post-conviction relief. Smith came to the Supreme Court in November, contending that the state supreme court’s ruling was contrary to clearly established Supreme Court decisions – the standard for relief under federal post-conviction laws.

Five days later, the Supreme Court decided June Medical Services LLC v. Russo, a 2020 decision that struck down Louisiana abortion regulations, though Chief Justice John Roberts’ concurring opinion arguably limited aspects of Whole Woman’s Health. In his petition, Cameron argues that he should have been allowed to intervene to defend the Kentucky law and that the 6th Circuit’s decision striking the law down should be reconsidered in light of June Medical.

There they found drugs and firearms. Three years later, federal authorities indicted Woodard on several charges stemming from the search; each charge turned on the government’s ability to prove Woodard’s constructive possession of the drugs. Woodard moved to dismiss the indictment, alleging unconstitutional pre-indictment delay.

. The government grudgingly concedes there is a split on the issue, and raises a welter of arguments why review nevertheless isn’t warranted. We’ll have a better idea Monday whether the court is persuaded.

As a child, she said, their mother beat him “over and over” due to his intellectual shortcomings.

First, Supreme Court decisions in 2017 and 2019 made clear that under federal law, the relevant standards for intellectual disability in capital cases are the current definitions by the American Psychiatric Association and the American Association on Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities. Bourgeois maintained that he met both.

Since then, Bourgeois told the justices, the playing field has changed in two ways.

The Supreme Court ruled in 2002 in Atkins v. Virginia that it is unconstitutional to execute someone who is mentally disabled. After receiving his death sentence, Bourgeois sought a ruling from a federal court in Texas that he was intellectually disabled and thus barred from execution. His appeal was unsuccessful.

Second, in the summer of 2019, the federal government began scheduling executions for the first time in more than 15 years.

“The Court today allows the execution of Alfred Bourgeois to proceed even though Bourgeois, who has an IQ between 70 and 75, argues that he is intellectually disabled under current clinical standards,” Sotomayor wrote. She argued that the court should have ordered a stay and taken up Bourgeois’ appeal in order to resolve whether his execution (and those of similarly situated people on death row) is barred by the Federal Death Penalty Act’s prohibition on executing people with intellectual disabilities.

The statute does not apply to a state’s procedural rules on issues like scheduling the execution date, the government told the justices. In a two-sentence order, the court lifted the D.C. Circuit’s stay. Justices Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan indicated that they would have left the stay in place.

A third case involved whether Montgomery was ineligible for the death penalty due to mental illness. Montgomery’s attorneys argued that she had bipolar disorder, suffered intense hallucinations and continued to experience psychological effects of severe childhood sexual abuse.

Finally, Montgomery argued in a fourth case that the Justice Department violated a federal regulation when it scheduled her execution.

“If the date designated for execution passes by reason of a stay of execution, then a new date shall be designated promptly by the Director of the Federal Bureau of Prisons when the stay is lifted.”

Montgomery was the first woman to be executed by the federal government since 1953. No other women are currently on federal death row.

Montgomery also became the 11th person to be put to death by the federal government since last July, when the Trump administration ended a 17-year moratorium on federal executions.

In their first appeal, Johnson’s lawyers raised two issues: intellectual disability and eligibility for resentencing.

In the second appeal, lawyers for Johnson and Higgs contended that putting their clients to death by lethal injection while their lungs were still recovering from damage due to the coronavirus would subject them to unconstitutional levels of suffering, in violation of the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

Vialva’s attorneys argued that Texas law requires a minimum of 91 days between the order setting the date and the execution, and they said the federal government was obliged to follow that provision of state law.

The Federal Death Penalty Act’s requirement that a United States marshal must implement a federal execution in accordance with the sentencing state’s laws “does not require the federal government to adhere to state procedures that do not effectuate death,” the government said.

The Department of Justice responded that the district court was correct in denying his motion to postpone his execution because LeCroy did not meet the standards for a stay of execution.

“neither the Constitution nor any statute or regulation grants petitioner any right to an execution date that facilitates attendance by all of his (or his preferred) counsel.”

LeCroy was the sixth person on federal death row to be executed this year, following the resumption of federal executions after a 17-year hiatus. A seventh person, Christopher Vialva, is scheduled to be executed on Thursday.

Three justices — Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Clarence Thomas and Brett Kavanaugh — indicated that they would have allowed the execution to go forward under Alabama’s policy. The remaining two justices – Justices Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch – did not publicly disclose how they voted, but at least one of them must have voted with the three liberal justices and Barrett to prevent the execution from occurring without a spiritual adviser.

Murphy v. Collier. In that case, a Buddhist inmate challenged Texas’ policy of allowing Christian and Muslim spiritual advisers in the execution chamber while excluding clergy representing other religions, arguing that the policy discriminated against him. The court put the Buddhist inmate’s execution on hold, and Kavanaugh wrote a separate opinion suggesting that one solution would be for the state to bar all spiritual advisers from the execution chamber. Both Texas and Alabama adopted that policy.

Kagan explained that any restrictions on Smith’s religious rights must satisfy a stringent test – which, she concluded, Alabama’s policy cannot. Kagan acknowledged that prison security is a compelling interest, but she emphasized that the federal government and some states have allowed clergy members without a connection to the government to attend executions without resulting in any security concerns.

The arguments were originally scheduled to be heard in March, but the coronavirus pandemic canceled that hearing.

"Your client said that he was interested in serving as a judge on any court and yet there were several opportunities for him to apply to judgeships for which he was qualified and he didn't do it," Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. asked Finger. "So why shouldn't we not take his standing assertions as serious?"

"As long as this constitutional provision is in effect, and he's an independent, he's not going to get a position," she said. "So why would we insist that he has to file an application?"

The issue has gained some attention outside the First State since nearly two-thirds of Fortune 500 companies are incorporated in Delaware, making the state's courts a prime venue to arbitrate corporate law.

he Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank, filed a brief in support of Adams arguing Delaware unconstitutionally discriminates against those who are not members of the two main political parties. "The Supreme Court should make clear that the work of a judge is not dependent on political interests and that supposed concerns over 'political balance' may not be used to justify partisan tests for judicial office," according to Cato's website. 

In an opinion by Justice Clarence Thomas, the court explained that because Uzuegbunam showed that he was injured and that his injury resulted from the officials’ conduct, the question before the justices was whether he meets the third criterion to have a legal right to sue: Is he seeking a remedy that is likely to correct the constitutional violation in the case?

Because nominal damages were available as a remedy in early English and American law, Thomas continued, a request for nominal damages will meet the third criterion to have a legal right to sue as long as the plaintiff’s claim is based on a violation that has already finished.

“Uzuegbunam experienced a completed violation of his constitutional rights” when the officials enforced the college’s speech policies, and because “nominal damages can redress Uzuegbunam’s injury even if he cannot or chooses not to quantify that harm in economic terms,” his case can proceed.