Supreme Court overturns Eighth Circuit Decision allowing minor to sue to have an abortion

[NewYorkExpress]

https://www.politico.com/news/2023/03/20/jackson-dissents-in-scotus-abortion-case-00087840

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson dissented Monday as the Supreme Court wiped out a federal appeals court ruling that upheld the right of a minor to go to court to obtain permission to seek an abortion without parental notification.

That lower court decision, issued last April by the St. Louis-based 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, seems moot as a result of the Supreme Court’s momentous Dobbs ruling last June that overturned Roe v. Wade and ended the federal constitutional right to abortion.


The high court’s order Monday directed the appeals court to vacate the judgment in the case out of Missouri and declare it moot.


The Supreme Court issued no opinion or detailed explanation for its action. However, Jackson penned a solo, four-page dissent arguing that the justices have become too liberal in granting requests from parties to nullify rulings issued by lower courts.

“This case presents absolutely no ‘extraordinary’ circumstances” justifying vacating the lower court’s decision, wrote Jackson, President Joe Biden’s only appointee on the high court.

“In my view, it is crucial that we hold the line and limit the availability of Munsingwear vacatur to truly exceptional cases,” she added, referring to a key precedent on when such action is appropriate.

Jackson emphasized that, in her view, “mere disagreement with the decision that one seeks to have vacated cannot suffice” to justify the unusual step.

No other justice recorded any objection to the high court’s action, which was announced as part of a routine set of orders issued Monday morning.

A bit surprised Ketanji Brown Jackson is the only dissenter. I would have expected at least Sotomayor to join her here.

I guess Brown Jackson's trying to be left wing's version of Alito now that she's on the court?

[Donerail]

A bit surprised Ketanji Brown Jackson is the only dissenter. I would have expected at least Sotomayor to join her here.

I guess Brown Jackson's trying to be left wing's version of Alito now that she's on the court?

How, pray tell, does Justice Jackson's stance on Munsingwear vacatur suggest she is "trying to be left wing's version of Alito"? I can't recall Justice Alito having previously written on the topic. Justice Sotomayor did dissent in one of the travel ban cases that was resolved on Munsingwear, but she would have DIGed it and did not write an opinion, so I'm not sure why you're so surprised she did not join Justice Jackson's opinion here either.

Actually, to stop playing around: The opinion is not about abortion. There was an opinion called Dobbs you may have heard of that obliterated the underlying constitutional right, and the constitutional issue in the 8th Circuit’s opinion vanished with it. Justice Jackson’s opinion is solely about the merits and use of a technical doctrine that doesn’t have an obvious partisan valence. You should read it before opining on it.