Suzanne Roberts (sroberts28)'s Public Profile in the Diigo Community

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Hein v. Freedom From Religion Foundation, Inc., 551 U.S. 06157 (2007) on 2008-08-28
- It has long been established, however, that the payment of taxes is generally
  not enough to establish standing to challenge an action taken by the Federal
  Government
- narrow exception
- 16 more annotations...
- - Flast v. Cohen, 392 U.S. 83, 102 (1968) , held that plaintiffs with an
    Establishment Clause claim could “demonstrate the necessary stake as taxpayers
    in the outcome of the litigation to satisfy Article III requirements.” Here, the
    controlling, plurality opinion declares that Flast does not apply, but a
    search of that opinion for a suggestion that these taxpayers have any less stake
    in the outcome than the taxpayers in Flast will come up empty: the
    plurality makes no such finding, nor could it. Instead, the controlling opinion
    closes the door on these taxpayers because the Executive Branch, and not the
    Legislative Branch, caused their injury. I see no basis for this distinction in
    either logic or precedent, and respectfully dissent.
  - plaintiff asserting an Establishment Clause claim has standing to challenge a
    law authorizing the use of federal funds in a way that allegedly violates the
    Establishment Clause
  - In the present case, Congress did not specifically authorize the use of federal
    funds to pay for the conferences or speeches that the plaintiffs challenged.
    Instead, the conferences and speeches were paid for out of general Executive
    Branch appropriations
  - The requisite elements of Article III standing are well established: “A
    plaintiff must allege personal injury fairly traceable to the defendant’s
    allegedly unlawful conduct and likely to be redressed by the requested relief.”
    Allen v. Wright, 468 U.S. 737, 751 (1984) .
  - must “ ‘refrai[n] from passing upon the constitutionality of an act … unless
    obliged to do so in the proper performance of our judicial function, when the
    question is raised by a party whose interests entitle him to raise it.
  - The party who invokes the power must be able to show not only that the statute
    is invalid but that he has sustained or is immediately in danger of sustaining
    some direct injury as the result of its enforcement, and not merely that he
    suffers in some indefinite way in common with people generally
  - As a general matter, the interest of a federal taxpayer in seeing that Treasury
    funds are spent in accordance with the Constitution does not give rise to the
    kind of redressable “personal injury” required for Article III standing.
  - Of course, a taxpayer has standing to challenge the collection of a
    specific tax assessment as unconstitutional; being forced to pay such a tax
    causes a real and immediate economic injury to the individual taxpayer. See,
    e.g., Follett v. Town of McCormick, 321 U.S. 573 (1944) (invalidating tax on preaching on First Amendment grounds).
  - matter of public and not of individual concern
  - The link between congressional action and
    constitutional violation that supported taxpayer standing in Flast is
    missing here. Respondents do not challenge any specific congressional action or
    appropriation; nor do they ask the Court to invalidate any congressional
    enactment or legislatively created program as unconstitutional. That is because
    the expenditures at issue here were not made pursuant to any Act of Congress.
    Rather, Congress provided general appropriations to the Executive Branch to fund
    its day-to-day activities.⁴ These appropriations did not
    expressly authorize, direct, or even mention the expenditures of which
    respondents complain. Those expenditures resulted from executive discretion, not
    congressional action.
  - this case falls outside the “the narrow exception” that Flast “created
  - It would also raise serious separation-of-powers concerns
  - Relaxation of standing requirements is directly related to the expansion of
    judicial power,” and lowering the taxpayer standing bar to permit challenges of
    purely executive actions “would significantly alter the allocation of power at
    the national level, with a shift away from a democratic form of government.”
  - Either Flast v. Cohen, 392 U.S. 83 (1968) , should be applied to (at a minimum)
    all challenges to the governmental expenditure of general tax revenues in
    a manner alleged to violate a constitutional provision specifically limiting the
    taxing and spending power, or Flast should be repudiated. For me, the
    choice is easy. Flast is wholly irreconcilable with the Article III
    restrictions on federal-court jurisdiction that this Court has repeatedly
    confirmed are embodied in the doctrine of standing.
  - the plurality offers no explanation of why the factual differences between this
    case and Flast are material
  - Whether the challenged government expenditure is expressly allocated by a
    specific congressional enactment has absolutely no relevance to the
    Article III criteria of injury in fact, traceability, and redressability
Allen v. Wright, 468 U.S. 737 (1984) on 2008-08-25
- general prohibition on a litigant's raising another person's legal rights, the
  rule barring adjudication of generalized grievances more appropriately addressed
  in the representative branches, and the requirement that a plaintiff's complaint
  fall within the zone of interests protected by the law invoked
- In many cases the standing question can be answered chiefly by comparing the
  allegations of the particular complaint to those made in prior standing cases.
- 20 more annotations...
- - Typically, however, the standing inquiry requires careful judicial examination
    of a complaint's allegations to ascertain whether the particular plaintiff is
    entitled to an adjudication of the particular claims asserted.
  - If the abstract stigmatic injury were cognizable, standing would extend
    nationwide to all members of the particular racial groups against which the
    Government was alleged to be discriminating by its grant of a tax exemption to a
    racially discriminatory school, regardless of the location of that school. All
    such persons could claim the same sort of abstract stigmatic injury respondents
    assert in their first claim of injury.
  - Constitutional limits on the role of the federal courts preclude such a
    transformation
  - Despite the constitutional importance of curing the injury alleged by
    respondents, however, the federal judiciary may not redress it unless standing
    requirements are met.
  - The diminished ability of respondents' children to receive a desegregated
    education would be fairly traceable to unlawful IRS grants of tax exemptions
    only if there were enough racially discriminatory private schools receiving tax
    exemptions in respondents' communities for withdrawal of those exemptions to
    make an appreciable difference in public school integration.
  - The links in the chain of causation between the challenged Government conduct
    and the asserted injury are far too weak for the chain as a whole to sustain
    respondents' standing
  - "Carried to its logical end, [respondents'] approach would have the federal
    courts as virtually continuing monitors of the wisdom and soundness of Executive
    action; such a role is appropriate for the Congress acting through its
    committees and the 'power of the purse'; it is not the role of the judiciary,
    absent actual present or immediately threatened injury resulting from unlawful
    governmental action." Laird v. Tatum, 408 U.S., at 15, 92 S.Ct., at 2326.
  - The Constitution, after all, assigns to the Executive Branch, and not to the
    Judicial Branch, the duty to "take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed."
    U.S. Const., Art. II, § 3.
  - Court displays a startling insensitivity to the historical role played by the
    federal courts in eradicating race discrimination from our Nation's schools
  - In these cases, the respondents have alleged at least one type of injury that
    satisfies the constitutional requirement of "distinct and palpable injury."3
    In particular, they claim that the IRS's grant of tax-exempt status to racially
    discriminatory private schools directly injures their children's opportunity and
    ability to receive a desegregated education. As the complaint specifically
    alleges, the IRS action being challenged
  - The resulting exemptions and deductions provide tangible financial aid and other
    benefits which support the operation of racially segregated private schools. In
    particular, the resulting deductions facilitate the raising of funds to organize
    new schools and expand existing schools in order to accommodate white students
    avoiding attendance in desegregating public school districts. Additionally, the
    existence of a federal tax exemption amounts to a federal stamp of approval
    which facilitates fund raising on behalf of racially segregated private schools.
    Finally, by supporting the development, operation and expansion of institutions
    providing racially segregated educational opportunities for white children
    avoiding attendance in desegregating public schools, defendants are thereby
    interfering with the efforts of courts, HEW and local school authorities to
    desegregate public school districts which have been operating racially dual
    school systems." Complaint ¶ 21, App. 24.
  - With all due respect, the Court has either misread the complaint or is
    improperly requiring the respondents to prove their case on the merits in order
    to defeat a motion to dismiss
  - Norwood explicitly stands for the proposition that governmental aid to racially
    discriminatory schools is a direct impediment to school desegregation
  - of a kind that is directly traceable to the governmental action being challenged
  - the Court's conclusion to the contrary is based on a unjustifiably narrow
    reading of the respondents' complaint and an indefensibly limited interpretation
    of our holding in Norwood.
  - The purpose of the standing inquiry is to measure the plaintiff's stake in the
    outcome, not whether a court has the authority to provide it with the outcome it
    seeks
  - The strength of the plaintiff's interest in the outcome has nothing to do with
    whether the relief it seeks would intrude upon the prerogatives of other
    branches of government; the possibility that the relief might be inappropriate
    does not lessen the plaintiff's stake in obtaining that relief.
  - If a plaintiff presents a nonjusticiable issue, or seeks relief that a court may
    not award, then its complaint should be dismissed for those reasons, and not
    because the plaintiff lacks a stake in obtaining that relief and hence has no
    standing
  - encourage undisciplined, ad hoc litigation,
  - The Executive requires latitude to decide how best to enforce
    the law, and in general the Court may well be correct that the exercise of that
    discretion, especially in the tax context, is unchallengeable.
    
    110
    However, as the Court also recognizes, this principle does not
    apply when suit is brought "to enforce specific legal obligations whose
    violation works a direct harm,"
Dickerson v. U.S., 530 U.S. 428 (2000) on 2008-08-25
- a constitutional decision of this Court, may not be in effect overruled by an
  Act of Congress
- We hold that Miranda, being a constitutional decision of this Court, may not be
  in effect overruled by an Act of Congress, and we decline to overrule Miranda
  ourselves.
- 4 more annotations...
- - "has the right to remain silent, that anything he says can be used against him
    in a court of law, that he has the right to the presence of an attorney, and
    that if he cannot afford an attorney one will be appointed for him prior to any
    questioning if he so desires."
  - Because of the obvious conflict between our decision in Miranda and §3501, we
    must address whether Congress has constitutional authority to thus supersede
    Miranda
  - Congress retains the ultimate authority to modify or set aside any judicially
    created rules of evidence and procedure that are not required by the
    Constitution.
  - the Court emphasized that it could not foresee "the potential alternatives for
    protecting the privilege which might be devised by Congress or the States," and
    it accordingly opined that the Constitution would not preclude legislative
    solutions that differed from the prescribed Miranda warnings but which were "at
    least as effective in apprising accused persons of their right of silence and in
    assuring a continuous opportunity to exercise it."
Cooper v. Aaron, 358 U.S. 1 (1958) on 2008-08-25
- It follows that the interpretation of the Fourteenth Amendment enunciated by
  this Court in the Brown case is the supreme law of the land
- Art. VI of the Constitution makes it of binding effect on the States
- 1 more annotations...
- - It is, of course, quite true that the responsibility for public education is
    primarily the concern of the States, but it is equally true that such
    responsibilities, like all other state activity, must be exercised consistently
    with federal constitutional requirements as they apply to state action.
Cohens v. Virginia, 19 U.S. 264 (1821) on 2008-08-20
- 11th amendment
- 11th amendment
- 17 more annotations...
- - the 11th amendment
  - 11th amendment
  - They maintain that the constitution of the United States has provided no
    tribunal for the final construction of itself, or of the laws or treaties of the
    nation; but that this power may be exercised in the last resort by the Courts of
    every State in the Union
  - If it be to maintain that a case arising under the constitution, or a law, must
    be one in which a party comes into Court to demand something conferred on him by
    the constitution or a law, we think the construction too narrow
  - If, upon a just construction of that instrument, it shall appear that the State
    has submitted to be sued, then it has parted with this sovereign right of
    judging in every case on the justice of its own pretensions, and has entrusted
    that power to a tribunal in whose impartiality it confides
  - this Union cannot exist without a government for the whole;
  - The maintenance of these principles in their purity, is certainly among the
    great duties of the government. One of the instruments by which this duty may be
    peaceably performed, is the judicial department.
  - are we at liberty to insert in this general grant, an exception of those cases
    in which a State may be a party?
  - We think a case arising under the constitution or laws of the United States, is
    cognizable in the Courts of the Union, whoever may be the parties to that case.
  - In that enumeration, we find 'controversies between two or more States, between
    a State and citizens of another State,' 'and between a State and foreign States,
    citizens, or subjects.'
  - The mere circumstance, that a State is a party, gives jurisdiction to the Court.
    How, then, can it be contended, that the very same instrument, in the very same
    section, should be so construed, as that this same circumstance should withdraw
    a case from the jurisdiction of the Court, where the constitution or laws of the
    United States are supposed to have been violated? The constitution gave to every
    person having a claim upon a State, a right to submit his case to the Court of
    the nation.
  - We do not mean to say, that the jurisdiction of the Courts of the Union should
    be construed to be co-extensive with the legislative, merely because it is fit
    that it should be so; but we mean to say, that this fitness furnishes an
    argument in construing the constitution which ought never to be overlooked, and
    which is most especially entitled to consideration, when we are inquiring,
    whether the words of the instrument which purport to establish this principle,
    shall be contracted for the purpose of destroying it.
  - No government ought to be so defective in its organization, as not to contain
    within itself the means of securing the execution of its own laws against other
    dangers than those which occur every day.
  - This leads to a consideration of the 11th amendment
  - That the United States form, for many, and for most important purposes, a single
    nation, has not yet been denied. In war, we are one people. In making peace, we
    are one people. In all commercial regulations, we are one and the same people.
  - The constitution and laws of a State, so far as they are repugnant to the
    constitution and laws of the United States, are absolutely void.
  - Dismissing the unpleasant suggestion, that any motives which may
    not be fairly avowed, or which ought not to exist, can ever influence a State or
    its Courts, the necessity of uniformity, as well as correctness in expounding
    the constitution and laws of the United States, would itself suggest the
    propriety of vesting in some single tribunal the power of deciding, in the last
    resort, all cases in which they are involved.
Martin v. Hunter's Lessee, 14 U.S. 304 (1816) on 2008-08-20
- The constitution of the United States was ordained and established, not by the
  states in their sovereign capacities, but emphatically, as the preamble of the
  constitution declares, by 'the people of the United States
- The constitution was not, therefore, necessarily carved out of existing state
  sovereignties, nor a surrender of powers already existing in state institutions
- 12 more annotations...
- - The third article of the constitution is that which must
    principally attract our attention. The 1st. section declares, 'the judicial
    power of the United States shall be vested in one supreme court, and in such
    other inferior courts as the congress may, from time to time, ordain and
    establish.' The 2d section declares, that 'the judicial power shall extend to
    all cases in law or equity, arising under this constitution, the laws of the
    United States, and the treaties made, or which shall be made, under their
    authority; to all cases affecting ambassadors, other public ministers and
    consuls; to all cases of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction; to controversies
    to which the United States shall be a party; to controversies between two or
    more states; between a state and citizens of another state; between citizens of
    different states; between citizens of the same state, claiming lands under the
    grants of different states; and between a state or the citizens thereof, and
    foreign states, citizens, or subjects.' It then proceeds to declare, that 'in
    all cases affecting ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls, and those
    in which a state shall be a party, the supreme court shall have original
    jurisdiction. In all the other cases before mentioned the supreme court
    shall have appellate jurisdiction, both as to law and fact, with such
    exceptions, and under such regulations, as the congress shall make.'
  - The object of the constitution was to establish three great departments of
    government; the legislative, the executive, and the judicial departments. The
    first was to pass laws, the second to approve and execute them, and the third to
    expound and enforce them.
  - to suppose that it was not an obligation binding on them, but might, at their
    pleasure, be omitted or declined, is to suppose that, under the sanction of the
    constitution, they might defeat the constitution itself
  - The constitution was an act of the people of the United States to supercede the
    confederation, and not to be ingrafted on it
  - appellate jurisdiction is given by the constitution to the supreme court in all
    cases where it has not original jurisdiction; subject, however, to such
    exceptions and regulations as congress may prescribe.
  - The words are, 'the judicial power (which includes appellate power) shall extend
    to all cases,' &c., and 'in all other cases before mentioned the
    supreme court shall have appellate jurisdiction.' It is the case, then,
    and not the court, that gives the jurisdiction.
  - If the text be clear and distinct, no restriction upon its plain and obvious
    import ought to be admitted, unless the inference be irresistible.
  - On the other hand, if, as has been contended, a discretion be
    vested in congress to establish, or not to establish, inferior courts at their
    own pleasure, and congress should not establish such courts, the appellate
    jurisdiction of the supreme Court would have nothing to act upon, unless it
    could act upon cases pending in the state courts. Under such circumstances it
    must be held that the appellate power would extend to state courts; for the
    constitution is peremptory that it shall extend to certain enumerated cases,
    which cases could exist in no other courts. Any other construction, upon this
    supposition, would involve this strange contradiction, that a discretionary
    power vested in congress, and which they might rightfully omit to exercise,
    would defeat the absolute injunctions of the constitution in relation to the
    whole appellate power.
  - When, therefore, the states are stripped of some of the highest attributes of
    sovereignty, and the same are given to the United States; when the legislatures
    of the states are, in some respects, under the control of congress, and in every
    case are, under the constitution, bound by the paramount authority of the United
    States; it is certainly difficult to support the argument that the appellate
    power over the decisions of state courts is contrary to the genius of our
    institutions.
  - In this connexion we are led again to the construction of the words of the
    constitution, 'the judicial power shall extend,' &c. If, as has been
    contended at the bar, the term 'extend' have a relative signification, and mean
    to widen an existing power, it will then follow, that, as the confederation gave
    an appellate power over state tribunals, the constitution enlarged or widened
    that appellate power to all the other cases in which jurisdiction is given to
    the courts of the United States.
  - uniformity of decisions throughout the whole United States
  - the plaintiff may always elect the state court, the defendant may be deprived of
    all the security which the constitution intended in aid of his rights. Such a
    state of things can, in no respect, be considered as giving equal rights
Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. 137 (1803) on 2008-08-19
- The government of the United States has been emphatically termed a government of
  laws, and not of men.
- office of justice of peace
- 22 more annotations...
- - has been created by special act of congress, and has been secured, so far as the
    laws can give security to the person appointed to fill it
  - Is the act of delivering or withholding a commission to be considered as a mere
    political act belonging to the executive department alone
  - [W]hether the legality of an act of the head of a department be examinable in a
    court of justice or not, must always depend on the nature of that act
  - But where a specific duty is assigned by law, and individual rights depend upon
    the performance of that duty, it seems equally clear that the individual who
    considers himself injured has a right to resort to the laws of his country for a
    remedy.
  - the validity of his appointment must have been determined by judicial authority
  - latest point of time which can be taken as that at which the appointment was
    complete
  - was when
  - the seal of the United States was affixed to the commission
  - person applying for it must be without any other specific and legal remedy
  - it is not wonderful that in such a case as this, the assertion, by an
    individual, of his legal claims in a court of justice, to which claims it is the
    duty of that court to attend, should at first view be considered by some, as an
    attempt to intrude into the cabinet, and to intermeddle with the prerogatives of
    the executive
  - The province of the court is, solely, to decide on the rights of individuals,
    not to inquire how the executive, or executive officers, perform duties in which
    they have a discretion
  - If one of the heads of departments commits any illegal act, under colour of his
    office, by which an individual sustains an injury, it cannot be pretended that
    his office alone exempts him from being sued
  - It is not by the office of the person to whom the writ is directed, but the
    nature of the thing to be done, that the propriety or impropriety of issuing a
    mandamus is to be determined
  - The constitution vests the whole judicial power of the United States in one
    supreme court
  - This power is expressly extended to all cases arising under the laws of the
    United States; and consequently, in some form, may be exercised over the present
    case; because the right claimed is given by a law of the United States.
  - Affirmative words are often, in their operation, negative of other objects than
    those affirmed; and in this case, a negative or exclusive sense must be given to
    them or they have no operation at all.
  - It cannot be presumed that any clause in the constitution is intended to be
    without effect; and therefore such construction is inadmissible, unless the
    words require it.
  - That they should have appellate jurisdiction in all other cases, with such
    exceptions as congress might make, is no restriction; unless the words be deemed
    exclusive of original jurisdiction.
  - When an instrument organizing fundamentally a judicial system, divides it into
    one supreme, and so many inferior courts as the legislature may ordain and
    establish; then enumerates its powers, and proceeds so far to distribute them,
    as to define the jurisdiction of the supreme court by declaring the cases in
    which it shall take original jurisdiction, and that in others it shall take
    appellate jurisdiction, the plain import of the words seems to be, that in one
    class of cases its jurisdiction is original, and not appellate; in the other it
    is appellate, and not original. If any other construction would render the
    clause inoperative, that is an additional reason for rejecting such other
    construction, and for adhering to the obvious meaning.
  - The authority, therefore, given to the supreme court, by the act establishing
    the judicial courts of the United States, to issue writs of mandamus to public
    officers, appears not to be warranted by the constitution; and it becomes
    necessary to inquire whether a jurisdiction, so conferred, can be exercised.
  - Certainly all those who have framed written constitutions
    contemplate them as forming the fundamental and paramount law of the nation, and
    consequently the theory of every such government must be, that an act of the
    legislature repugnant to the constitution is void.
  - Thus, the particular phraseology of the constitution of the
    United States confirms and strengthens the principle, supposed to be essential
    to all written constitutions, that a law repugnant to the constitution is void,
    and that courts, as well as other departments, are bound by that
    instrument.
    
    164
    The rule must be discharged