Labrador v. Poe

P R E L I M I N A R Y P R I N T
Volume 601 U. S. Part 2
Pages 1110–1135
OFFICIAL REPORTS
OF
T H E S U P R E M E C O U R T
April 15, 2024
REBECCA A. WOMELDORF
reporter of decisions
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N O T I C E : This preliminary print is subject to formal revision before
the bound volume is published. Users are requested to notify the Reporter
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pio@supremecourt.gov, of any typographical or other formal errors.

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April 15, 2024 601 U. S.
of petitioner for leave to proceed in forma pauperis denied, and
cer
tiorari dismissed. See this Court's Rule 39.8. As petitioner
has repeatedly abused this Court's process, the Clerk is directed
not to accept any further petitions in noncriminal matters from
petitioner unless the docketing fee required by Rule 38(a) is paid
and the petition is submitted in compliance with Rule 33.1. See
Martin v. District of Columbia Court of Appeals, 506 U. S. 1
(1992) (per curiam).
No. 23–6700. Green v. Walt Disney Co. C. A. 9th Cir.
Motion of petitioner for leave to proceed in forma pauperis de-
nied, and certiorari dismissed. See this Court's Rule 39.8.
No. 23–6929. Wilmore v. United States. C. A. 11th Cir.
Motion of petitioner for leave to proceed in forma pauperis de-
nied, and certiorari dismissed. See this Court's Rule 39.8. As
petitioner has repeatedly abused this Court's process, the Clerk
is directed not to accept any further petitions in noncriminal mat-
ters from petitioner unless the docketing fee required by Rule
38(a) is paid and the petition is submitted in compliance with Rule
33.1. See Martin v. District of Columbia Court of Appeals, 506
U. S. 1 (1992) (per curiam).
Miscellaneous Orders
No. 23A763. Labrador, Attorney General of Idaho v.
Poe, By and Through Her Parents and Next Friends, Poe
et al., et al. Application for stay, presented to Justice
Kagan, and by her referred to the Court, granted. The Decem-
ber 26, 2023, order of the United States District Court for the
District of Idaho, case No. 1:23–cv–269, is stayed, except as to the
provision to the plaintiffs of the treatments they sought below,
pending the disposition of the appeal in the United States Court
of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and disposition of a petition for
writ of certiorari, if such a writ is timely sought. Should certio-
rari be denied, this stay shall terminate automatically. In the
event certiorari is granted, the stay shall terminate upon the
sending down of the judgment of this Court. Justice Kagan
would deny the application for stay.
Justice Gorsuch, with whom Justice Thomas and Justice
Alito join, concurring.
Early in the litigation below, the district court issued a prelimi-
nary injunction. Ordinarily, injunctions like these may go no fur-
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ther than necessary to provide interim relief to the parties. In
th
is case, however, the district court went much further, prohibit-
ing a State from enforcing any aspect of its duly enacted law
against anyone. Today, the Court stays the district court's in-
junction to the extent it applies to nonparties, which is to say to
the extent it provides “universal” relief. That is a welcome
development.
I
To appreciate the signifcance of the Court's ruling, some back-
ground helps. In 2023, Idaho adopted the Vulnerable Child Pro-
tection Act. The law sought to regulate a number of “ `practices
upon a child for the purpose of attempting to alter the . . . child's
sex.' ” 709 F. Supp. 3d 1169, 1179 (Idaho 2023). Those practices
range from “surgeries that sterilize or mutilate” a child's genitals
to the supply of “[p]uberty-blocking medication.” Ibid. Idaho
claimed that its law aimed to protect children from treatments
that can cause “lasting harm and irreversible damage.” Id., at
1199 (internal quotation marks omitted). The law's provisions
were scheduled to take effect January 1, 2024.
Before that could happen, two children and their parents sued
Idaho's attorney general and a local prosecutor in federal district
court. The children and their parents alleged that, without ac-
cess to puberty blockers and estrogen, the two minor plaintiffs
would likely suffer serious mental health problems. Decl. of
P. Poe in No. 1:23–cv–269 (D Idaho), ECF Doc. 32–2, ¶¶14, 19,
22; Decl. of J. Doe, ECF Doc. 32–4, ¶¶14, 16, 23–24. Shortly
after fling suit, the plaintiffs asked the district court to issue a
preliminary injunction.
The district court agreed to do so. But instead of enjoining
state offcials from enforcing the law with respect to the plaintiffs
and the drug treatments they sought, the district court entered
a universal injunction. 709 F. Supp. 3d, at 1199–1200. That is,
the court prohibited the defendants from enforcing “any provi-
sion” of the law under any circumstances during the life of the
parties' litigation. Id., at 1200. Among other things, this meant
Idaho could not enforce its prohibition against surgeries to re-
move or alter children's genitals, even though no party before the
court had sought access to those surgeries or demonstrated that
Idaho's prohibition of them offended federal law. The court's
order promised to suspend Idaho's law indefnitely, too, as this

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l itigati on ( l ike many today) may t ake years to reach fi na l
judg
ment.
Idaho responded by appealing the district court's preliminary
injunction decision to the Ninth Circuit. The State also asked
the Ninth Circuit to stay the preliminary injunction during the
pendency of the appeal. At the least, the State argued, the court
of appeals should stay the universal aspect of the district court's
injunction so that at least some portions of its duly enacted law
might fnally take effect.
After the Ninth Circuit denied Idaho's stay request in a brief
unreasoned order, the State proceeded here. Before us, the State
does not challenge the preliminary injunction to the extent it
ensures the two minor plaintiffs in this case continued access to
their drug treatments. That aspect of the district court's order
will remain in place pending appeal. The State asks us to stay
the preliminary injunction only to the extent it bars Idaho from
enforcing any aspect of its law against any person anywhere in
the State.
II
Stay motions and other requests for interlocutory relief are
nothing new or particularly remarkable. In truth, they are per-
haps “as old as the judicial system of the [N]ation.” Scripps-
Howard Radio, Inc. v. FCC, 316 U. S. 4, 17 (1942). Every federal
court in this country has within its “traditional” toolkit the power
to pause temporarily its own order or one of a lower court or
issue other forms of interim relief. Id., at 9; see 28 U. S. C.
§ 1651(a); this Court's Rule 23.1; Fed. Rule App. Proc. 8(a).
Often, judges at all levels of the federal judiciary resolve motions
for interlocutory relief in brief orders like the one the Court
issues today and the Ninth Circuit did below. Judges have pro-
ceeded this way throughout the Nation's history. Indeed, many
courts could not effciently manage their dockets otherwise. Cf.
Wilson v. Sellers, 584 U. S. 122, 139 (2018) (Gorsuch, J., dissent-
ing) (“[A] busy appellate court sometimes may not see the proft
in devoting its limited resources to explaining the error [or] alter-
native basis for affrming . . . so it issues a summary affrmance
instead”).
Just as familiar are the rules that govern stay applications.
This Court, like every other federal court, is “guided” by the
same “sound . . . principles.” Nken v. Holder, 556 U. S. 418, 434
(2009) (internal quotation marks omitted); see Trump v. Interna-

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tional Refugee Assistance Project, 582 U. S. 571, 580 (2017)
(
per curiam); id., at 584 (Thomas, J., concurring in part and dis-
senting in part). We ask (1) whether the stay applicant has made
a strong showing that it is likely to succeed on the merits, (2)
whether it will suffer irreparable injury without a stay, (3)
whether the stay will substantially injure other parties interested
in the proceedings, and (4) where the public interest lies. Nken,
556 U. S., at 434. A court's “ ` “discretion” ' ” to enter a stay is
thus not left up to its mere “ ` “inclination, but to its judgment” ' ”
regarding each of these time-tested considerations. Ibid. (quot-
ing Martin v. Franklin Capital Corp., 546 U. S. 132, 139 (2005),
i n tur n quoti ng Un i ted Sta tes v. Bur r, 25 F. Cas. 30, 35
(No. 14,692d) (CC Va. 1807) (Marshall, C. J.)).
Applying that traditional stay test here yields a ready answer.
Start with the frst question: whether Idaho has shown it is
likely to succeed on the merits. This Court has long held that a
federal court's authority to fashion equitable relief is ordinarily
constrained by the rules of equity known “ `at the time of the
separation of ' ” this country from Great Britain. Grupo Mexi-
cano de Desarrollo, S. A. v. Alliance Bond Fund, Inc., 527 U. S.
308, 318 (1999); see Guaranty Trust Co. v. New York, 326 U. S.
99, 105 (1945); Boyle v. Zacharie & Turner, 6 Pet. 648, 658 (1832).
Under those rules, this Court has said, a federal court may not
issue an equitable remedy “more burdensome to the defendant
than necessary to [redress]” the plaintiff 's injuries. Califano v.
Yamasaki, 442 U. S. 682, 702 (1979); see Gill v. Whitford, 585
U. S. 48, 68 (2018) (“[A] `remedy must . . . be limited to the
inadequacy that produced the injury in fact that the plaintiff has
established' ”); Rhode Island v. Massachusetts, 12 Pet. 657, 718
(1838); Department of Homeland Security v. New York, 589 U. S.
1173, 1175 (2020) (DHS) (Gorsuch, J., concurring in grant of
stay); United States v. Texas, 599 U. S. 670, 693 (2023) (Gorsuch,
J., concurring in judgment); S. Bray, Multiple Chancellors: Reform-
ing the National Injunction, 131 Harv. L. Rev. 417, 425–428 (2017).
The district court's universal injunction defed these foun-
dational principles. It did not just vindicate the plaintiffs' ac-
cess to the drug treatments they sought. It purported to
bar the enforcement of “any provision” of the law against any-
one. 709 F. Supp. 3d, at 1200. The district court issued this
sweeping relief even though, by its own admission, the plaintiffs
had failed to “engage” with other provisions of Idaho's law that

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don't presently affect them—including the law's provisions prohib-
iti
ng the surgical removal of children's genitals. Id., at 1199. In
choosing such an extraordinary remedy, the district court clearly
strayed from equity's traditional bounds.
The remaining stay factors—the relative harms to the parties
and the public interest—point to the same conclusion. Members
of this Court have long held that, “ `[a]ny time a State is enjoined
by a court from effectuating statutes enacted by representatives
of its people, it suffers a form of irreparable injury.' ” Maryland
v. King, 567 U. S. 1301, 1303 (2012) (Roberts, C. J., in chambers)
(quoting New Motor Vehicle Bd. of Cal. v. Orrin W. Fox Co., 434
U. S. 1345, 1351 (1977) (Rehnquist, J., in chambers)). Likewise,
this Court has held that “[t]here is always a public interest in
prompt execution” of the law, absent a showing of its unconstitu-
tionality. Nken, 556 U. S., at 436.
Both considerations favor Idaho. The district court purported
to bar the State from bringing into effect portions of a statute
that no party has shown, and no court has held, likely offensive
to federal law. The district court's order promised to run for the
life of this lawsuit, thus preventing Idaho from executing any
aspect of its law for years. Meanwhile, the plaintiffs face no
harm from the partial stay the State requests. Even with it, the
district court's preliminary injunction will operate to prevent
state authorities from taking any action to interfere with their
ability to access the particular drug treatments they seek.
III
The dissent disputes none of this. It does not question that
Idaho is entitled to relief under this Court's traditional stay test.
Instead, it laments the number of requests for interim relief this
Court has recently faced in “high-profle” cases. Post, at 1130
(Jackson, J., dissenting from grant of stay). To deter future ap-
plications of that sort, the dissent proposes adding to our tradi-
tional stay test new factors alien to our precedents and historic
equitable practice. Respectfully, however, the dissent's proposals
miss the mark.
First, the dissent suggests that we should refuse to intervene
when both a district court and a court of appeals have refused a
party's request for interim relief. Post, at 1131. But the dissent
does not explain how this system of upside-down precedent works,
where the Supreme Court is somehow bound to follow lower court

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decisions. Of course, no one questions that the Court should (as
it
does) afford due respect to the work of our lower court col-
leagues. See, e. g., Little v. Reclaim Idaho, 591 U. S. –––, –––
(2020) (Roberts, C. J., concurring in grant of stay). But the
dissent does not explain why due respect should be replaced with
abject deference, or how the rule it proposes would allow us
to discharge faithfully our own obligation to assess fairly and
independently the cases that come to us. Nor, for that matter,
does the dissent attempt to reconcile its proposed new rule with
the fact that, over the last 12 months, this Court has (repeatedly)
granted interim relief to the federal government in the face of
contrary lower court rulings.
1
Perhaps sensing these problems and convinced of the correct-
ness of this Court's recent interventions, the dissent ultimately
fashions itself an escape hatch. Tucked away in a footnote, the
dissent adds that it does not mean to suggest that the “burden” of
overcoming adverse lower court decisions “can never be carried.”
Post, at 1131, n. 1. But if that's true, when does the dissent
believe we should intervene, and when not? And why was it
appropriate for this Court to override lower court decisions in so
many other recent cases but it is inappropriate to do the same
here? The dissent never says. So much for the added clarity
and “restraint” it hopes to bring to our law. Post, at 1135.
Second, the dissent suggests that, before granting relief, we
should ask whether a case is “certworthy.” Post, at 1132. But
it isn't clear how that would help matters either. In the past,
various individual Justices faced with requests for interlocutory
relief in chambers, sometimes while the Court stood in recess,
considered whether four Justices would likely agree to take up
the dispute. That practice may be understandable. But when
hearing many stay requests, this one included, we sit as a full
Court. And here, a majority has decided that this case is worthy
of the Court's attention.
1
See, e. g., Murthy v. Missouri, 601 U. S. ––– (2023) (overriding a lower
court order prohibiting the government from coercing or encouraging social
media companies to censor private speech); Garland v. Blackhawk Mfg.
Group, Inc., 601 U. S. ––– (2023) (setting aside a lower court order prohibit-
ing the government from enforcing its regulation restricting the sale of
ghost guns); FDA v. Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine, 598 U. S. ––– (2023)
(countermanding a lower court order staying the Food and Drug Administra-
tion's approval of mifepristone, an abortion drug).
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It has done so, too, for good reason. This case poses a question
about
the propriety of universal injunctive relief—a question of
great signifcance that has been in need of the Court's attention
for some time. DHS, 589 U. S., at 1175 (opinion of Gorsuch, J.);
Griffn v. HM Florida-ORL, LLC, 601 U. S. –––, ––– (2023) (state-
ment of Kavanaugh, J.). This case also implicates an apparent
circuit split, as courts of appeals have disagreed about whether
district courts may issue the sort of sweeping relief the district
court issued here when faced with laws very much like Idaho's.
See, e. g., Brandt v. Rutledge, 47 F. 4th 661, 672 (CA8 2022); L. W.
v. Skrmetti, 83 F. 4th 460, 489–490 (CA6 2023). Even applying
the dissent's proposed standard for relief, then, this case would
seem to satisfy it.
2
Third, the dissent suggests that the Court should exercise more
“caution” and “restraint” in cases like this one, where a party does
not challenge the entry of a preliminary injunction but asks us to ad-
dress only the scope of the remedy it provides. Post, at 1130, 1132–
1133. But if “caution” and “restraint” are our watchwords, why
would a party's request for narrower rather than broader relief
“counsel against our intervention”? Post, at 1130. Do we really
want to incentivize parties to seek more sweeping relief in order to
enhance their chances of success in this Court? And how does
2
The dissent seeks to downplay the “certworthiness” of this case by re-
casting the universal aspect of the district court's order as an “incidenta[l]”
feature designed to protect the plaintiffs' anonymity. See post, at 1131, n. 2,
1132, and n. 3. But labeling universal relief incidental does not make it
so. The district court faced two plaintiffs seeking access to certain specifc
treatments, yet it issued an order applicable to all potential nonparties and
all regulated treatments. There was nothing incidental about it. Tellingly,
too, the district court nowhere paused to address the adequacy of less intru-
sive (and truly incidental) measures to protect the plaintiffs' anonymity—for
example, a sealed order, shared with pertinent state authorities and the
plaintiffs' physicians, guaranteeing them access to the particular treatments
they seek. Today, the Court supplies a much-needed reminder that courts
cannot so easily sidestep the traditional equitable rule that the relief a fed-
eral court may issue “must . . . be limited to the inadequacy that produced
the injury in fact that the plaintiff has established.” Gill v. Whitford, 585
U. S. 48, 68 (2018) (internal quotation marks omitted). In doing so, the
Court does not, as the dissent suggests, “ignor[e]” the district court's reason
for granting universal relief. Post, at 1132, n. 3. Rather, the Court recog-
nizes that “aspect of the District Court's decision” for what it is—an unper-
suasive departure from our precedents. Ibid.
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it serve “caution” and “restraint” for this Court to allow lower
cour
ts to transgress foundational remedial principles more readily
than foundational liability principles? Especially when pursuing
that course would mean (as it does here) that a single federal
judge may erroneously suspend the operation of a law adopted
by the people's elected representatives for years on end? Once
more, the dissent offers no answers.
Fourth, the dissent contends that we should exercise special
“caution” when considering whether to intervene in “high-profle
cases.” Post, at 1130. But by any measure, a great deal of cau-
tion is already baked into the Nken analysis. To warrant this
Court's intervention, an applicant seeking a stay must make a
“ `strong showing ' ” on the merits, demonstrate an “ `irreparable' ”
harm, and persuade the Court that the public interest warrants
intervention. Nken, 556 U. S., at 434. The dissent does not ex-
plain why these traditional cautionary notes are insuffcient.
Nor does it explain why we should reserve an added new meas-
ure of caution for “high profle” matters alone. I would have
thought that, as judges, we should neither deliberately seek out
nor evade “high-profle” disputes, but afford all litigants who come
before us their lawful due. Even taking the dissent's test on its
own terms, too, my colleagues fail to explain why this case quali-
fes for special caution as “high profle” but so many others in the
last 12 months did not. Does anyone really think that this
Court's recent interventions—in cases involving ghost guns, alle-
gations of government censorship, and abortion access—were
warranted because the laws at issue there were less “high-profle”
than Idaho's? See n. 1, supra.
3
3
The dissent chides me for neglecting to mention that the State stamped
the word “EMERGENCY” on the front cover of its stay application. Post,
at 1133. But it is not obvious what point the dissent is trying to make.
Ibid., n. 4. In its recent stay applications, the federal government hasn't
always affxed a similar stamp on its papers. See, e. g., Application in
No. 23A302, Garland v. Blackhawk Mfg. Group, Inc. (Oct. 5, 2023); Applica-
tion in No. 23A243, Murthy v. Missouri (Sept. 14, 2023); Application in
No. 22A902, FDA v. Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine (Apr. 14, 2023).
Should we have denied those applications on that basis? In truth, every
applicant for interim relief believes its case qualifes as an “emergency.”
Our traditional stay test helps us evaluate those assertions by focusing our
attention on factors such as irreparable harm, the balance of equities, and
the public interest. The dissent does not explain what additional value an
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IV
N
one of this is to suggest the dissent is without a point. Per-
haps the Court has seen a rise in the number of applications for
interim relief. But if so, it seems to me that this trend is not
the result of (nor does it justify tinkering with) this Court's prece-
dents and traditional equitable standards. Instead, at least part
of the problem may be attributable to a departure from those
precedents and standards in the lower courts. In recent years,
certain district courts across the country have not contented
themselves with issuing equitable orders that redress the injuries
of the plaintiffs before them, but have sought instead to govern
an entire State or even the whole Nation from their courtrooms.
Today, Idaho is on the receiving end of one of these universal
injunctions, but lately it has often been the federal government.
4
As best I can tell, universal injunctions are a relatively new
phenomenon. By some accounts, universal injunctions against
the federal government during President Franklin D. Roosevelt's
tenure—those 12 eventful years covering the Great Depression,
the New Deal, and most of World War II—were virtually un-
known. See Bray, 131 Harv. L. Rev., at 434–435. Others have
pointed to a single example of a “nation-wide” decree during that
period, but there the Court reversed the lower court's “sweeping ”
ruling for lack of standing. Perkins v. Lukens Steel Co., 310
U. S. 113, 117, 120–121 (1940). Even as late as President Barack
Obama's administration, some estimate that lower courts issued
only about 19 universal injunctions against the federal govern-
ment over the course of eight years. See Dept. of Justice, J.
Rosen, Opening Remarks at Forum on Nationwide Injunctions
analysis. Nor, for that matter, does the dissent square its proposed new
“emergency” test with its other proposals. Take the dissent's preference for
avoiding high-profle cases. See post, at 1130, 1133. Does the dissent mean
to suggest that we should grant relief only in “emergencies,” but only so
long as they also keep a low profle?
4
Many of this Court's recent orders granting interim relief were the prod-
uct of a different and unrelated problem: the profound “intrusions on civil
liberties” governments attempted in response to COVID–19. Arizona v.
Mayorkas, 598 U. S. –––, ––– (2023) (statement of Gorsuch, J.). And, “[n]ot
surprisingly,” the number of requests for interim relief in this Court “has
shrunk in the years since COVID–19.” Post, at 1128, n. 5 (Kavanaugh, J.,
concurring in the grant of stay).
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and Federal Regulatory Programs (Feb. 12, 2020). Since then,
howe
ver, universal injunctions have proliferated. By one count,
lower courts issued 55 universal injunctions during the frst three
years of President Donald Trump's administration. Ibid. And if
the last 12 months are any indication, it seems that trend has
continued apace during the administration of President Joseph R.
Biden, Jr. See, e. g., n. 1, supra (citing examples).
A rising number of universal injunctions virtually guarantees
that a rising number of “high-profle” cases will fnd their way to
this Court. Just consider this case. Idaho does not challenge
the district court's injunction to the extent it addresses the plain-
tiffs' asserted injuries. The State seeks relief here only because
and to the extent the district court prevented it from enforcing
any aspect of its duly enacted law against anyone—all without
any showing that other provisions in the statute violate federal
law or the rights of any current party. As in so many other
recent cases, the district court's universal injunction effectively
transformed a limited dispute between a small number of parties
focused on one feature of a law into a far more consequential
referendum on the law's every provision as applied to anyone.
What's worse, universal injunction practice is almost by design
a fast and furious business. Normally, parties spend “their time
methodically developing arguments and evidence” before proceed-
ing to a trial and fnal judgment limited to the persons and claims
at hand. DHS, 589 U. S., at 1175 (opinion of Gorsuch, J.). If
they seek relief for a larger group of persons, they must join those
individuals to the suit or win class certifcation. In universal-
injunction practice, none of that is necessary. Just do a little
forum shopping for a willing judge and, at the outset of the case,
you can win a decree barring the enforcement of a duly enacted
law against anyone. Once that happens, the affected government
(state or federal) will often understandably feel bound to seek imme-
diate relief from one court and then the next, with the fnish line in
this Court. After all, if the government does not act promptly, it
can expect a law that the people's elected representatives have
adopted as necessary and appropriate to their present circumstances
will remain ineffectual for years on end. In all these ways, univer-
sal injunctions circumvent normal judicial processes and “tend to
force judges into making rushed, high-stakes, low-information
decisions” at all levels. Id., at 1176 (opinion of Gorsuch, J.).
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Today, the Court takes a signifcant step toward addressing
the
problem. It does so not by reworking our precedents and
traditional equitable practices, but by enforcing them. It focuses
directly on a root cause of the recent proliferation of interlocutory
litigation in “high profle” matters, sets aside a district court's
universal injunction, and in the process reminds lower courts of
the foundational rule that any equitable remedy they issue must
not be “more burdensome to the defendant than necessary to
[redress]” the plaintiff 's injuries. Califano, 442 U. S., at 702.
Lower courts would be wise to take heed. Retiring the univer-
sal injunction may not be the answer to everything that ails us.
But it will lead federal courts to become a little truer to the
historic limits of their offce; promote more carefully reasoned
judicial decisions attuned to the facts, parties, and claims at hand;
allow for the gradual accretion of thoughtful precedent at the
circuit level; and reduce the pressure on governments to seek
interlocutory relief in this Court. A return to a more piecemeal
and deliberative judicial process may strike some as ineffcient.
It may promise less power for the judge and less drama and
excitement for the parties and public. But if any of that makes
today's decision wrong, it makes it wrong in the best possible
ways, for “good judicial decisions are usually tempered by older
virtues.” DHS, 589 U. S., at 1176.
Justice Kavanaugh, with whom Justice Barrett joins,
concurring.
A Federal District Court in Idaho preliminarily enjoined Idaho
from enforcing its new Vulnerable Child Protection Act. The
U. S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit declined to stay the
injunction. Idaho then fled an emergency application in this
Court for a partial stay of the injunction. The Court today
grants Idaho's emergency application. I agree with the Court's
decision.
I add this concurring opinion to explain how this Court typi-
cally resolves emergency applications in cases like this—namely,
in cases where a party has sought to enjoin enforcement of a new
state or federal law in the often years-long period until a fnal
decision on the merits.
Traditionally, one important factor when this Court decides an
emergency application involving a new law is likelihood of success
on the merits. The likelihood of success on the merits factor can

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vanaugh, J., concurring
pose diffculty, however, because it can require the Court to assess
the
merits of important cases earlier and more quickly than is
ordinarily preferable, and to do so without the beneft of full
merits briefng and oral argument. But when resolving emer-
gency applications involving signifcant new laws, this Court often
cannot avoid that diffculty. It is not ideal, but it is reality.
Given that reality, the Court must then determine the best proc-
esses for analyzing likelihood of success on the merits in emer-
gency cases.
I
Here is how the issue typically arises. After a new federal
statute, federal regulation, or state law has been enacted, an ad-
versely affected party who contends that the new law violates
the Constitution or federal law may seek a pre-enforcement pre-
liminary injunction in federal district court. A preliminary in-
junction prevents the government from enforcing its new law
pending the eventual decision on the merits. If the district court
grants a preliminary injunction, the government may promptly
seek a stay in the court of appeals. Or if the district court denies
a preliminary injunction, the plaintiff may promptly seek an in-
junction in the court of appeals.
The party that loses in the court of appeals may then seek
emergency relief in this Court. The losing party may argue, for
example, that a consequential new law has been mistakenly en-
joined or mistakenly green-lighted by the lower courts, and ask
this Court to grant relief.
When an emergency application comes to this Court, we must
decide it—grant or deny. The Court has no authority to reject
or turn away emergency flings without deciding them.
It is critical to appreciate the signifcance of the decision that
this Court is being asked to make in emergency cases involving
new laws. Keep in mind how much time it takes for the litigation
process to run its course and reach a fnal merits ruling in the
district court, court of appeals, and potentially this Court—often
one to three years or even longer. The fnal merits decision,
when it occurs, will of course be important. But the interim
status of the law—that is, whether the law is enforceable during
the several years while the parties wait for a fnal merits ruling—
itself raises a separate question of extraordinary signifcance to
the parties and the American people. And that is the question
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this Court often must address when deciding emergency applica-
ti
ons involving new laws.
1
Consider a few examples. Suppose that a State enacts a new
online defamation law. Do communications and media companies
have to alter their editorial policies and posting practices to com-
ply with that new speech law during the several years while its
constitutionality under the First Amendment is being litigated on
the merits? Or suppose that EPA issues major new environmen-
tal regulations. Do businesses have to restructure their opera-
tions or build new facilities to comply with the new regulations
during the multiyear period while the legality of the regulations
is being challenged in court? Cf. West Virginia v. EPA, 577 U. S.
1126 (2016) (enjoining Clean Power Plan pending review by the
Court of Appeals and Supreme Court).
In those emergency cases, the plaintiffs—including individuals
and businesses—often will suffer irreparable harm if the relevant
government offcials are not enjoined from enforcing the law dur-
ing that multiyear period. But on the fip side, other parties—
including the Federal Government, the States, or other individu-
als and businesses—often will suffer irreparable harm if the
relevant government offcials are enjoined from enforcing the law
during that multiyear period.
If the moving party has not demonstrated irreparable harm,
then this Court can avoid delving into the merits. But not
infrequently—especially with important new laws—the harms and
equities are very weighty on both sides. In those cases, this
Court has little choice but to decide the emergency application
by assessing likelihood of success on the merits. Courts histori-
cally have relied on likelihood of success as a factor because, if
the harms and equities are suffciently weighty on both sides, the
best and fairest way to decide whether to temporarily enjoin a
law pending the fnal decision is to evaluate which party is most
likely to prevail in the end.
2
1
The Court also receives emergency applications in other contexts, such
as capital cases, election-law cases, and a smorgasbord of other matters.
But a distinct diffculty arises when we consider emergency applications in-
volving the enforcement of new federal or state laws. This opinion uses
“laws” as shorthand to include regulations and executive policies as well.
2
This Court has used different formulations of the factors for granting
emergency relief. All formulations basically encompass (1) likelihood of suc-
cess on the merits (or a fair prospect of success); (2) certworthiness; (3) the

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1110
Ka
vanaugh, J., concurring
The merits issues raised in emergency applications involving
new
laws can be consequential and diffcult. And those applica-
tions can require this Court to assess the merits on a tight time-
line—without the beneft of many reasoned lower-court opinions,
full merits briefng, and oral argument. It is worth noting that
this diffculty is not unique to this Court—lower courts must also
deal with applications for interim relief that can require them to
assess the merits on a tight timeline.
That scenario is not always optimal for orderly judicial decision-
making. So various suggestions have been made to eliminate or
reduce the need for this Court to address likelihood of success on
the merits when resolving emergency applications involving new
laws. Some suggestions have force; others are questionable. As
I see it, none completely eliminates the need for this Court to
make those calls.
First, some suggest that this Court, when receiving an emer-
gency application involving a new law, should adopt a default
posture of deference to the court of appeals' ruling on a stay or
injunction, especially when the court of appeals has not disturbed
the district court's ruling on whether to grant or deny an injunc-
tion. See, e. g., post, p. 1130 (Jackson, J., dissenting from grant of
stay). Under that view, this Court should deny most emergency
applications in cases involving new laws, regardless of whether
an injunction against enforcement of the law was ultimately up-
held or denied by the court of appeals.
I respectfully disagree with that suggestion. Again, whether
a new federal or state law can be enforced during the several
years before a fnal ruling on the merits can itself be an important
national question. And this Court has a responsibility to resolve
major questions of national importance. So a default policy of
off-loading to lower courts the fnal word on whether to green-
light or block major new laws for the several years until a fnal
ruling on the merits would amount to an abdication of this Court's
proper role. Moreover, given the possibility that different courts
of appeals might reach different conclusions on whether to enjoin
harms to the parties; and (4) the equities and public interest. See, e. g.,
Hollingsworth v. Perry, 558 U. S. 183, 190 (2010) (per curiam). For present
purposes, I will treat likelihood of success as equivalent to a fair prospect of
success. If there is any meaningful difference among the common formula-
tions of the emergency-relief factors (which I tend to doubt), those distinc-
tions can be explored if necessary in a future case.

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the enforcement of a new law for the several years pending fnal
re
view, a deferential approach could lead to substantial uncer-
tainty and disuniformity that become untenable in cases involving
nationwide government programs or national businesses.
I would therefore not adopt a default position where the Court
always (or almost always) denies emergency applications involving
new laws. Rather, the Court needs some way to evaluate when
to grant relief. And one of the traditional, tried-and-true factors
has been likelihood of success on the merits.
Second, one might reasonably think that this Court, when deal-
ing with an emergency application, should simply try to “preserve
the status quo.” Sounds attractive in theory. But in practice,
diffculties emerge when trying to defne the status quo. Is the
status quo the situation on the ground before enactment of the
new law? Or is the status quo the situation after enactment of
the new law, but before any judicial injunction? Or is the status
quo the situation after any district court ruling on a preliminary
injunction? Or is the status quo the situation after a court of
appeals ruling on a stay or injunction?
There is no good blanket answer to the question of what the
status quo is. Each conception of the status quo is defensible,
but there is no sound or principled reason to pick one over another
as a rule to apply in all cases involving new laws.
And even if we could settle on one defnition of the status
quo, applying that one defnition consistently across the range
of emergency applications would lead to very troubling results.
Suppose, for example, that the status quo is defned to mean the
status before enactment of the new law. If courts applied that
rule across the board, some plainly constitutional and democrati-
cally enacted laws would effectively be blocked for several years
pending the fnal decision on the merits. Or suppose instead that
the status quo is defned as the status after the new law is in
place. In that case, some plainly unconstitutional or otherwise
illegal laws would nonetheless remain in effect and be enforced
against individuals and businesses for several years pending the
fnal decision on the merits.
I doubt that anyone would tolerate such an inequitable and
scattershot approach. So even if we could defne the status quo
in theory in a principled way across all cases, a blanket rule of
“preserving the status quo” in application would not be suitable
for this Court's emergency docket. That is yet another reason

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1110
Ka
vanaugh, J., concurring
why the Court throughout its history has relied on likelihood of
success
on the merits as an essential factor in determining when
to grant emergency relief in individual cases.
Third, Justice Barrett has emphasized that the Court can
and should take care to focus on certworthiness when considering
emergency applications. Does 1–3 v. Mills, 595 U. S. 1029 (2021)
(Barrett, J., concurring in denial of application for injunctive
relief ). If the underlying merits issue would not warrant this
Court's review when the case returned to the Court on the merits
docket, then we should deny the application and leave the ques-
tion of interim relief to the court of appeals. I fully agree with
Justice Barrett's important insight. Emphasizing certworthi-
ness as a threshold consideration helps to prevent parties from
using “the emergency docket to force the Court to give a merits
preview in cases that it would be unlikely to take.” Ibid.
Of course, the certworthiness factor is, by defnition, only a
partial cure for the issue here: Although emphasizing that factor
reduces the number of emergency applications involving new laws
where we have to assess the merits, some of the most signifcant
and diffcult emergency applications will readily clear the certwor-
thiness bar. And in those cases, we may still have to assess
likelihood of success on the merits.
Fourth, some suggest that the Court should prohibit so-called
nationwide and statewide injunctions—injunctions that prevent
enforcement of a law against persons other than the plaintiffs.
The theory is that eliminating nationwide and statewide injunc-
tions by district courts will in turn reduce the number of emer-
gency applications involving new laws that make it to this Court,
or at least reduce the number of applications where this Court
needs to assess the merits.
As I see it, prohibiting nationwide or statewide injunctions may
turn out to be the right rule as a matter of law regardless of its
impact on this Court's emergency docket. See ante, at 1112–
1113, 1120 (Gorsuch, J., concurring in grant of stay). More to
the point for present purposes, I agree that such a rule could
somewhat reduce the number of emergency applications that
make it to this Court and require the Court to assess the merits.
To begin with, the government party might not seek immediate
appellate (or Supreme Court) review of a preliminary injunction
that is confned to one or a few individual parties. And an emer-

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gency application to this Court where the issue concerns only a
few
individual parties may not clear the certworthiness bar.
3
That said, a rule prohibiting nationwide or statewide injunc-
tions would not eliminate the need for this Court to assess the
merits of some emergency applications involving new laws. For
one, there is ongoing debate about whether any such rule would
apply to Administrative Procedure Act cases involving new fed-
eral regulations, given the text of the APA. See Griffn v. HM
Florida-ORL, LLC, 601 U. S. –––, ––– – –––, n. 1 (2023) (statement
of Kavanaugh, J., respecting denial of application for stay); 5
U. S. C. § 706(2). But put that caveat aside for now.
Even if a district court enjoins a new federal statute or state
law only as to the particular plaintiffs, that injunction could still
have widespread effect. For example, the plaintiff might be a
State, or the plaintiff might be an association that has many mem-
bers, or the plaintiffs might fle a class action for classwide injunc-
tive relief under Rule 23(b) of the Federal Rules of Civil Proce-
dure. So even if district court injunctions are confned to the
plaintiffs, there still will be emergency applications with nation-
ally important effects that come to this Court and clear the cert-
worthiness bar, thereby still requiring this Court to assess the
merits.
Moreover, the effects of a rule prohibiting nationwide or state-
wide injunctions on this Court's emergency docket can be dimin-
ished by vertical stare decisis. The general discussion of the
scope of district court injunctions often overlooks the important
role of the court of appeals. Even when district court injunctions
are limited to the plaintiffs, the losing party in the district court's
preliminary injunction proceeding may promptly seek an injunc-
tion or stay in the court of appeals. And any ensuing decision
by the court of appeals to grant or deny injunctive relief could
then have precedential effect—formally, when there is a preceden-
tial opinion, or perhaps informally, when there is not—on other
district courts in that circuit when other parties seek similar
injunctive relief. After all, with any consequential new law,
many different parties may seek preliminary injunctions in sepa-
rate proceedings in the district courts within a circuit.
3
The scope of the injunction may affect evaluation not only of certworthi-
ness but also of the harms to the government defendant and other affected
parties.

ORDERS 1127
1110
Ka
vanaugh, J., concurring
As a result, the ruling by the court of appeals on an emergency
appl
ication for a stay or injunction in a discrete case (or cases)
can often determine whether the new law continues to be en-
forced across the entire circuit. And in those circumstances, the
losing party in the court of appeals may seek relief in this Court
and point out that the court of appeals decision may have broader
circuitwide impact—and is therefore different from just a single
district court ruling involving a few plaintiffs. Put simply, when
a court of appeals ruling on an emergency stay or injunction
could affect enforcement of a signifcant new law throughout the
circuit, that broader impact may sometimes make the case signif-
cant enough to clear the certworthiness bar in this Court.
With any consequential new federal law, moreover, it is likely
that different parties will seek preliminary injunctions in multiple
circuits. And what happens if different courts of appeals reach
different results? For example, what if a major new federal law
regulating social media companies, or immigration, or energy pro-
ducers, or healthcare, or securities markets is enforceable in one
circuit but not in another for the several years pending fnal re-
view on the merits? That disuniformity could often be highly
problematic. Again, an emergency application to this Court in
those circumstances could clear the certworthiness bar, meaning
that we may still have to consider likelihood of success when
deciding it.
In short, a rule limiting the scope of district court injunctions
may be correct as a matter of law, even apart from its effects on
this Court's emergency docket. And the result of a rule against
nationwide or statewide injunctions may be to somewhat reduce
the number of emergency applications involving new laws where
this Court must assess likelihood of success on the merits. But
that rule would not eliminate the need for this Court to some-
times decide important emergency applications involving new
laws by assessing likelihood of success on the merits.
4
II
As the discussion so far has sought to illustrate, this Court
cannot avoid evaluation of the merits in at least some emergency
applications involving consequential new laws.
4
Here, the State's application seeks a stay primarily because of the scope
of the injunction. That issue is itself certworthy, and I believe that the
State has a likelihood of success on that issue.
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Kavanaugh, J., concurring 601 U. S.
If I am correct about that basic reality, another important ques-
ti
on concerns this Court's processes. What process should this
Court employ for assessing likelihood of success on the merits
with respect to an emergency application, particularly in cases
involving important new federal or state laws? Given the ex-
traordinary signifcance of the question whether a consequential
new law can be enforced during the several years while merits
litigation is ongoing, the Court should use as many tools as feasi-
ble and appropriate to make the most informed and best decision.
Sometimes that might mean taking more time (if available), order-
ing supplemental briefng, or inviting amicus briefs. In certain
circumstances, moreover, the Court might beneft from oral argu-
ment or may even grant certiorari before judgment.
Especially in recent years, the Court has employed many of
those tools to help the Court better decide important emergency
applications. See, e. g., Biden v. Nebraska, 600 U. S. 477 (2023)
(Court granted certiorari before judgment and expedited oral ar-
gument after receiving emergency application involving federal
student loan forgiveness program); National Federation of Inde-
pendent Business v. OSHA, 595 U. S. 109 (2022) (per curiam)
(Court granted expedited oral argument after receiving emer-
gency application involving OSHA vaccine mandate); Biden v.
Missouri, 595 U. S. 87 (2022) (per curiam) (same, for emergency
application involving CMS vaccine mandate). And I believe that
the Court should continue to be fexible in employing appropriate
procedures so as to best decide important emergency applications.
A related question is whether the Court should issue opinions—
that is, opinions for the Court as distinct from separate concurring
or dissenting opinions—to publicly explain our grounds for grant-
ing or denying an emergency application involving an important
new law. Opinions for the Court can sometimes be appropriate
in order to explain our reasoning, as in the vaccine mandate cases,
for example. See ibid.
5
That said, an opinion for the Court ad-
5
During the COVID–19 pandemic, the Court sometimes found it important
to issue opinions on COVID–19-related legal questions, in part because of
the widespread assumption that the pandemic would largely be over before
any fnal ruling on the merits in the court system. Therefore, the emer-
gency docket during the COVID–19 pandemic in essence was the merits
docket as to certain COVID–19-related issues. Not surprisingly, this
Court's emergency docket, while still robust, has shrunk in the years since
COVID–19.
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ORDERS 1129
1110
Ka
vanaugh, J., concurring
dressing likelihood of success on the merits for an emergency
appl
ication can sometimes come at a cost. A written opinion
by this Court assessing likelihood of success on the merits at a
preliminary stage can create a lock-in effect because of the opin-
ion's potential vertical precedential effect (de jure or de facto),
which can thereby predetermine the case's outcome in the pro-
ceedings in the lower courts and hamper percolation across other
lower courts on the underlying merits question. (Of course, that
can happen to a lesser degree even when the Court simply issues
a bare-bones order granting or denying relief.) So in my view,
issuing opinions for the Court with respect to emergency applica-
tions may sometimes be appropriate, but we should exercise ap-
propriate caution before doing so.
***
Although the volume of cases challenging new laws and coming
to this Court on the emergency docket is a relatively recent devel-
opment, this Court's emergency docket—and the diffculties asso-
ciated with it—are not new. The emergency docket has always
existed, and both the Court and even individual Justices acting
in chambers have made a plethora of important decisions for the
Nation in an emergency posture. See, e. g., West Virginia v.
EPA, 577 U. S. 1126 (2016) (temporarily enjoining Clean Power
Plan); Purcell v. Gonzalez, 549 U. S. 1 (2006) (per curiam) (vacat-
ing injunction pending appeal regarding state voter ID law);
Rubin v. United States, 524 U. S. 1301 (1998) (Rehnquist, C. J.,
in chambers) (denying stay pending certiorari of order enforcing
subpoenas to Secret Service agents regarding observations of the
President); Schlesinger v. Holtzman, 414 U. S. 1321 (1973) (Mar-
shall, J., in chambers) (staying District Court's injunction that
ordered a halt to bombing in Cambodia); Youngstown Sheet &
Tube Co. v. Sawyer, 343 U. S. 579, 584, 589 (1952) (after expedited
oral argument, affrming District Court's preliminary injunction
that proscribed seizure of steel mills by government); cf. Rosen-
berg v. United States, 346 U. S. 273, 283–285 (1953) (vacating stay
of execution of the Rosenbergs).
In my view, the Court can potentially reduce the number of
emergency applications involving new laws where the Court has
to assess likelihood of success on the merits. But this Court is
responsible for resolving questions of national importance, even
when they arise on the emergency docket. Fulflling that respon-

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Jackson, J., dissenting 601 U. S.
sibility will sometimes require us to assess likelihood of success
on
the merits in emergency cases involving new laws, as the
Court has in the past.
Justice Jackson, with whom Justice Sotomayor joins, dis-
senting from grant of stay.
When a party asks this Court to “sideste[p] the ordinary judi-
cial process” and intervene at an atypical juncture, our default
should be “restraint.” Barr v. East Bay Sanctuary Covenant,
588 U. S. 943, 945–946 (2019) (Sotomayor, J., dissenting from
grant of stay). We do not have to address every high-profle case
percolating in lower courts, and there are usually many good
reasons not to do so. Few applicants can meet our threshold
requirement of “an exceptional need for immediate relief,” by
showing that they will suffer not just substantial harm but an
“irreversible injury . . . occurring during the appeals process that
cannot be later redressed.” Louisiana v. American Rivers, 596
U. S. –––, ––– (2022) (Kagan, J., dissenting). Even when an appli-
cant establishes that highly unusual line-jumping justifcation, we
still must weigh the serious dangers of making consequential deci-
sions “on a short fuse without beneft of full briefng and oral
argument.” Does 1–3 v. Mills, 595 U. S. 1029 (2021) (Barrett, J.,
concurring in denial of application for injunctive relief ). Without
adequate caution, our decisions risk being not only “unreasoned,”
but unreasonable. Whole Woman's Health v. Jackson, 594 U. S.
–––, ––– (2021) (Kagan, J., dissenting from denial of application
for injunctive relief ).
This case presents numerous reasons for exercising restraint.
As explained in Part I below, the State of Idaho's emergency
application asks us to override the decisions of two lower courts
based on an issue not clearly implicated and under circumstances
where the State does not contest that its law should remain en-
joined as likely unconstitutional, at least as applied to the plain-
tiffs. As described in Part II, even if today's application actually
involved a “universal injunction,” the emergency docket would
not be the place to address the open and challenging questions
that that issue raises. I respectfully dissent.
I
Three interdependent reasons counsel against our intervention.
First of all, the applicant seeks displacement of the decisions of

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ORDERS 1131
1110
J
ackson, J., dissenting
both “the District Court and . . . a unanimous panel of the Court
of
Appeals.” Beame v. Friends of the Earth, 434 U. S. 1310,
1312 (1977) (Marshall, J., in chambers). A Federal District Court
determined that a never-before-in-effect Idaho law is likely uncon-
stitutional, and that court issued a preliminary injunction that
temporarily blocks the law's enforcement while it considers the
merits of the challengers' legal claims. Wishing to enforce the
challenged law during the course of the litigation, the State asked
for a stay pending appeal. But both the District Court and the
Ninth Circuit denied that request. Our respect for lower court
judges—no less committed to fulflling their constitutional duties
than we are and much more familiar with the particulars of the
case—normally requires an applicant seeking an emergency stay
from this Court after two prior denials to carry “an especially
heavy burden.” See Edwards v. Hope Medical Group for
Women, 512 U. S. 1301, 1302 (1994) (Scalia, J., in chambers) (inter-
nal quotation marks omitted).
1
Second, the State has not come close to carrying its heavy
burden in this case. No party disputes that, assuming all of the
other stay factors were met, Idaho needs to show “a reasonable
probability that this Court will grant certiorari” in order to obtain
an emergency stay. Maryland v. King, 567 U. S. 1301, 1302
(2012) (Roberts, C. J., in chambers) (internal quotation marks
omitted); see also Emergency Application for Stay 29–32; Re-
sponse in Opposition 19–24; Reply Brief 14–15.
2
Idaho maintains
1
The concurrence seems perplexed by the idea that lower court decisions
about interim relief deserve our respect. See ante, at 1114–1115 (opinion of
Gorsuch, J.) (hereinafter concurrence). In its telling, that “upside-down” sug-
gestion leaves this Court either powerless to correct mistakes or hopelessly in-
consistent when we do. Ante, at 1114. But to say that a party bears an espe-
cially heavy burden is not to say that burden can never be carried. See Little v.
Reclaim Idaho, 591 U. S. –––, ––– (2020) (Roberts, C. J., joined by, inter alios,
Gorsuch, J., concurring in grant of stay) (“No one has overlooked that the State
bears an `especially heavy burden' in justifying a stay pending its appeal to
the Ninth Circuit[,] . . . [b]ut in my view that burden has been met”). Even
when two lower courts deny relief, an applicant can still prevail in this
Court under our traditional emergency stay factors. The heavier burden,
though, has long served as a sobering reminder that, after two prior levels
of review, interim relief has consistently been deemed unwarranted.
2
While the concurrence appears to attribute the certworthiness consideration
to this dissent, see ante, at 1115–1116, it is standard practice for this Court
to assess certworthiness when evaluating an emergency application. See,

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that this case is certworthy because it raises the question whether
a
district court can issue an injunction that grants relief directed
to all potentially impacted nonparties—a so-called “universal
injunction.” The only problem: That's not what the District
Court did here. Far from attempting to grant relief to parties
not before it, the District Court expressly stated that, “[i]n the
absence of class certifcation, injunctive relief generally should be
limited to the named plaintiffs.” 709 F. Supp. 3d 1169, 1199
(Idaho 2023). Then, ultimately, the District Court settled on issu-
ing a statewide preliminary injunction for a party-centered, fact-
specifc reason: because it found that doing so was necessary to
protect the particular plaintiffs before the court, including two
minors proceeding under pseudonyms, against action by the State
it deemed likely unconstitutional. Id., at 1199–1200. Any error
by the District Court as to the necessity of the preliminary relief
it has chosen raises, at best, a factbound question, not a certwor-
thy issue.
3
Third, and fnally, Idaho seeks emergency relief without contest-
ing that its law should be preliminarily enjoined as likely uncon-
stitutional, at least as applied to the plaintiffs before the District
Court. See ante, at 1112 (opinion of Gorsuch, J.). The State takes
this litigating position while defending a statute that regulates ac-
cess to gender-affrming medical care for transgender children.
That is a serious and consequential matter, which, indeed, raises the
profle of this case and the stakes of our intervention, for the law
at issue here will have a signifcant practical impact on everyone
it affects. The constitutional questions around this law are
e. g., Does 1–3 v. Mills, 595 U. S. 1029 (2021) (Barrett, J., concur-
ring in denial of application for injunctive relief ); Little, 591 U. S., at
––– – –––; Hollingsworth v. Perry, 558 U. S. 183, 190 (2010)
(per curiam).
3
The concurrence all but ignores this key aspect of the District Court's
decision. See ante, at 1111–1112. But even the most ardent critics of “uni-
versal injunctions” acknowledge that, in providing relief to the parties be-
fore a court, an injunction may incidentally beneft nonparties. See, e. g.,
United States v. Texas, 599 U. S. 670, 693 (2023) (Gorsuch, J., concurring in
judgment); Trump v. Hawaii, 585 U. S. 667, 717 (2018) (Thomas, J., concur-
ring). We might ultimately disagree in this case about whether the District
Court's determination about the necessary scope of relief to protect the
plaintiffs qualifes as an abuse of discretion. See ante, at 1116, n. 2. But
any such debate would not transform the State's case-specifc, fact-intensive
request for error correction into a certworthy issue.

ORDERS 1133
1110
J
ackson, J., dissenting
signifcant as well because statutes like this one raise new and
complex
issues. Unlike in myriad other emergency cases, how-
ever, the State is not seeking interim relief based on any errors
by the lower courts with respect to consequential merits ques-
tions. Contra, ante, at 1116–1117.
Instead, in a troubling bid for this Court's early intervention,
the State asks us to wade into the middle of ongoing lower court
proceedings to weigh in on a single query concerning only one
aspect of a preliminary determination by the District Court:
whether the temporary relief that the District Court has afforded
pending its review of the merits sweeps too broadly. In my view,
we should resist being conscripted into service when our involve-
ment amounts to micromanaging the lower courts' exercise of
their discretionary authority in the midst of active litigation.
This Court is not compelled to rise and respond every time an
applicant rushes to us with an alleged emergency, and it is espe-
cially important for us to refrain from doing so in novel, highly
charged, and unsettled circumstances. Here, where the State
does not even seek relief from the District Court's determination
that the law is likely unconstitutional as to at least some of the
individuals it will impact, caution is especially warranted.
II
Justice Gorsuch's concurrence demonstrates the perils of
treating this application any other way. Conspicuously minimized
in that opinion is the word that appears, bolded and capitalized,
on the cover of the State's application: “EMERGENCY.” The
concurrence proceeds, instead, to treat the State's application as
a run-of-the-mill motion for interim relief, just as any court might
dispose of such a motion on its regular docket. See ante, at 1112.
From the standpoint of an interest in taming our emergency
docket, that is folly.
4
What is more, in resolving this particular application, the con-
currence reaches out to address an unsettled remedial issue that,
by the concurrence's own assessment, is of profound signifcance
4
This is not to say that the traditional stay factors do not matter, or that
this Court can only entertain an application that is labeled as an “emer-
gency.” See ante, at 1117–1118, n. 3. Rather, my point is that not every
alleged error made by a lower court judge warrants this Court's immediate
intervention and correction in real time, while the lower court's proceedings
are pending.
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1134 OCTOBER
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Jackson, J., dissenting 601 U. S.
for the functioning of our government. See ante, at 1118. It
appears,
then, that if the concurrence is right that “universal
injunctions . . . `tend to force judges into making rushed, high-
stakes, low-information decisions,' ” the majority has taken the
bait. Ante, at 1119.
To be clear, though, the Court has not decided the propriety of
“universal injunctions.” Whether federal courts have the power
to issue “universal injunctions” is “an important question that
could warrant our review in the future,” not a foregone conclusion
dictated by our precedent. Griffn v. HM Florida-ORL, LLC,
601 U. S. –––, ––– (2023) (Kavanaugh, J., statement respecting
denial of application for stay); see also, e. g., Department of Home-
land Security v. New York, 589 U. S. 1173, 1176 (2020) (Gorsuch,
J., concurring in grant of stay) (framing “underlying equitable and
constitutional questions raised by . . . nationwide injunctions” as
ones “we might at an appropriate juncture take up”). After
today, that question remains.
Nor does history offer an easily discernible answer. As one
leading scholar candidly admits, “traditional equity lacked the
sharply defned rule” that the concurrence would claim the Court
adopted today. S. Bray, Multiple Chancellors: Reforming the Na-
tional Injunction, 131 Harv. L. Rev. 417, 421 (2017). And other
leading scholars are actively debating what lessons can be gleaned
from the historical record. See A. Frost, In Defense of Nation-
wide Injunctions, 93 N. Y. U. L. Rev. 1065, 1080–1090 (2018) (offer-
ing an account of “universal injunctions” consistent with Article
III and American courts' traditional equitable powers); see also
M. Sohoni, The Lost History of the “Universal” Injunction, 133
Harv. L. Rev. 920, 1008 (2020) (expressing concern that, in debate
over the limits of federal courts' equitable powers, “we risk allow-
ing selectively crafted conceptions of historical tradition to run
away with us”).
Simply put, the questions raised by “universal injunctions” are
contested and diffcult. I would not attempt to take them on in
this emergency posture, even in a case that actually raised the
issue. We do not have full adversarial briefng, the benefts of
oral argument, or even a fnal opinion from the Court of Appeals.
To the extent we can draw any lesson from the lower courts at
this point, it is that, “when faced with laws very much like Ida-
ho's,” determining the appropriate bounds of equitable relief and
the propriety of “universal injunctions” is not straightforward.

ORDERS 1135
601 U. S.
Apr
il 15, 2024
Ante, at 1116 (citing Brandt v. Rutledge, 47 F. 4th 661, 672 (CA8
2022);
L. W. v. Skrmetti, 83 F. 4th 460, 489–490 (CA6 2023)).
***
All that said, I see some common ground. I agree that our
emergency docket seems to have become increasingly unworkable.
See ante, at 1118. I share the concern that courts heed the limits
of their power. See ante, at 1119–1120. And surely all could
beneft from “more carefully reasoned judicial decisions attuned
to the facts, parties, and claims at hand,” not to mention “a more
. . . deliberative judicial process.” Ante, at 1120. With respect,
though, I worry that we may be too eager to fnd fault in everyone
but ourselves.
This Court will almost certainly have a chance to consider the
entirety of this case soon, whoever prevails below. In the mean-
time, it is far better for all concerned to let the lower courts
proceed unfettered by our intervention. We can, and usually
should, wait to provide our assessment in the ordinary course—
when it is our turn to do so. Put differently, whenever this Court
must determine whether to exercise its discretionary power to
intervene in pending cases on an emergency basis, I frmly believe
we must proceed with both reason and restraint. Because the
majority demonstrates neither today, I respectfully dissent.
No. 23A829 (23–986). Rued et al. v. Hatcher, Judge, Hen-
nepin County, Minnesota, et al. C. A. 8th Cir. Application
for writ of injunction, addressed to Justice Thomas and referred
to the Court, denied.
No. 23M71. Villamonte v. United States; and
No. 23M76. Ing v. Tufts University. Motions for leave to
fle petitions for writs of certiorari with supplemental appendixes
under seal granted.
No. 23M72. Cantrell v. O’Malley, Commissioner of So-
cial Security;
No. 23M73. Jamerson v. Lumpkin, Director, Texas De-
partment of Criminal Justice, Correctional Institutions
Division;
No. 23M74. MSCHF Product Studio, Inc. v. Vans, Inc.,
et al.;
No 23M75. Nayee v. Administrator, New Jersey State
Prison et al.;
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Reporter’s Note
The attached opinion relating to order has been revised to refect the
usual publication and citation style of the United States Reports. The
revised pagination makes available the offcial United States Reports cita-
tion in advance of publication. Revisions may include adjustments to for-
matting, captions, citation form, and any errant punctuation. The follow-
ing additional edits were made:
p. 1112, line 8 from bottom: “may sometimes” is changed to “sometimes
may”