In Trump v. CASA, Inc., the Supreme Court held, 6 to 3, that federal courts lack the authority to issue universal injunctions if an injunction limited to the plaintiffs in that case will give those plaintiffs all the relief to which they’re entitled. The decision was based on two main conclusions: (1) “A universal injunction […]
Today’s Ad Law Reading Room entry is “The Past and Future of Universal Vacatur,” by Mila Sohoni, which was recently published by the Yale Law Journal and posted to SSRN. Here is the abstract: Universal vacatur, the judicial power to void a regulation, is a remedy rooted in the foundations of modern administrative law, not […]
In a recent post on this blog, Jonathan Adler has written an imaginative contribution to the currently lively controversy over the propriety of nationwide injunctions. Other prominent scholars have expressed interest in his argument for curtailing these injunctions. In this post, I will briefly explain why I agree with Adler’s policy position up to a […]
During oral argument in Department of Education v. Brown, the second case concerning the Biden Administration’s student loan forgiveness plan, the question arose whether it is proper for a single district or circuit court to impose a nationwide injunction against a federal policy where doing so is not necessary to provide complete relief to the […]
Earlier today we featured a fascinating post from John Harrison on the availability of nationwide injunctions under the Administrative Procedure Act. We have featured a number of blog posts on this debate about nationwide injunctions under the APA. To continue that debate, I thought I’d flag that Mila Sohoni submitted a law professor amicus brief […]
Today’s Ad Law Reading Room entry is “Vacatur Within the Appellate Model of Judicial Review,” by Emily Bremer, which is forthcoming in the Yale Law Journal. Here is the abstract: This Article situates vacatur within a holistic account of the appellate model of judicial review that Congress codified in the Administrative Procedure Act (APA). Revisionist […]
Justice Barrett’s majority opinion in Trump v. CASA, Inc. assured everyone that vacatur was not on the chopping block: “Nothing we say today resolves the distinct question whether the Administrative Procedure Act authorizes federal courts to vacate federal agency action.” By my lights, CASA did resolve that question—just not in so many words, and not […]
[Part I is available here.] In the first part of this post, we explored the history of section 706, and why it probably does not support universal remedies. But even so, several Justices have hinted at their hesitation to read vacatur out of the APA. This will force the Court to contend with the second […]
[Part II is available here.] Universal relief is dead; long live universal relief! With the recent decision in Trump v. CASA, nationwide injunctions have been taken off the table as a way to control agency power. But as innocuous footnote 10 of the majority opinion notes, there remains another way for courts to grant universal, […]
On Friday, the Supreme Court issued a 6-3 decision in Trump v. CASA, holding that universal (or nationwide) injunctions likely exceed the equitable authority that Congress vested in courts in the Judiciary Act of 1789. Accordingly, the Court granted partial stays of the district courts’ preliminary injunctions. In the orders under review, the district courts […]
Reflecting on the litigation over the FTC’s non-compete rule, it struck me that the Supreme Court’s decision in Corner Post is a huge win for the government masquerading as a loss. A key sentence in the opinion should put the last nail in the coffin of universal remedies. If I’m right about this prediction, Corner Post’s implications for […]
Corner Post v. Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System,[1] recently argued in the Supreme Court, mainly concerns the limitations period for judicial review of agency decisions. The case also raises issues about administrative law remedies, which came up briefly at the argument. Important for both sets of issues is that Corner Post, a private […]
Many lower federal courts hold that section 706(2) of the Administrative Procedure Act, 5 U.S.C. § 706(2), instructs courts reviewing agency regulations to vacate regulations that are unlawful as defined by that provision. Vacatur as the courts understand it is distinct from injunctions against enforcement proceedings and declaratory judgments. Unlike remedies that operate with respect […]
The debate over the propriety of the nationwide or “universal” injunction continues to unfold. Just this month, in a dissenting opinion in Little Sisters of the Poor v. Pennsylvania, Justices Ginsburg and Sotomayor took a stand in favor of the permissibility of such injunctions, balancing off comments to the contrary in earlier opinions by Justices […]
Followers of public-law litigation will be well versed in the debates surrounding so-called universal injunctions. Though definitions vary, one common definition of what makes an injunction “universal” is that it enjoins the government from enforcing laws “not only against the named plaintiffs, but against all persons everywhere who might be subject to enforcement of those […]