What happens if the Supreme Court rules like this?
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  What happens if the Supreme Court rules like this?
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Author Topic: What happens if the Supreme Court rules like this?  (Read 801 times)
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BRTD
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« on: January 28, 2019, 01:00:11 AM »

Someone brings a case against some law. SCOTUS takes the case.

Four justices rule in favor of the plaintiff and hold the law should be struck down. Four justices rule to uphold the law. The ninth justice sidesteps the law's constitutionality question entirely and just rules that the case is invalid on a technicality, such as that the plaintiff didn't have standing to sue or whatever.

Obviously the law is upheld, but what's the decision? It seems weird the ninth justice gets to write it when none of the others agree. Do both of the main sides get to write a dissent?
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True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)
Ernest
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« Reply #1 on: January 28, 2019, 06:21:04 AM »

The case would not be considered a precedent, leaving the way clear for a different case concerning the law to make its way to the court.
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Dereich
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« Reply #2 on: January 28, 2019, 08:15:37 AM »

Someone brings a case against some law. SCOTUS takes the case.

Four justices rule in favor of the plaintiff and hold the law should be struck down. Four justices rule to uphold the law. The ninth justice sidesteps the law's constitutionality question entirely and just rules that the case is invalid on a technicality, such as that the plaintiff didn't have standing to sue or whatever.

Obviously the law is upheld, but what's the decision? It seems weird the ninth justice gets to write it when none of the others agree. Do both of the main sides get to write a dissent?

The four who would have upheld the law concur with the result of the case, so any or all of those justices could write concurring opinions disagreeing with the 5th justice's reason for upholding the law and presenting their own reason. It would be the four who would strike the law down who would could choose (or not choose; concurrences and dissents aren't mandatory) dissenting opinions. Both the concurring and dissenting opinions could certainly be useful for future argument of the issue, but neither would have any binding authority.
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Kalwejt
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« Reply #3 on: January 28, 2019, 06:24:32 PM »

A per curiam opinion?
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SteveRogers
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« Reply #4 on: January 28, 2019, 11:02:59 PM »

This happens from time to time. There wouldn't be a true majority opinion. You would generally end up with an opinion joined by four justices "announcing the judgment of the court," an opinion "concurring in the judgment of the court" by the swing justice, and then dissent(s) by the other four justices.

As others have said, there wouldn't be a true precedent set. Lawyers would spend years afterwards arguing what the narrowest holding that five justices actually agreed on was, and when the issue came up again lawyers on both sides would argue about which plurality was more persuasive.

Off the top of my head, Vieth v. Jubelirer was something like what you're talking about. 4 justices agreed that partisan gerrymandering claims are nonjusticiable, 4 justices agreed that there are judicially manageable standards for policing partisan gerrymandering, and Kennedy wrote his own opinion agreeing with the majority that this particular case was nonjusticiable but holding out hope that the court might one day create a workable test for partisan gerrymandering claims. So the issue got kicked down the road without a clear precedent.   
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Orser67
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« Reply #5 on: January 31, 2019, 03:02:51 PM »

I agree with what others said, so I'll just link to the relevant wikipedia article:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plurality_opinion

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