Also known as: plurality opinions · plurality
Written by attorneys — see sources below.
A judicial opinion that garners the most votes on an appellate court when no single opinion receives support from a majority of the judges.
Priscilla Parks challenges the election of directors at Peak Performance after the incumbent slate receives the most votes but less than a majority. The state supreme court divides sharply on whether the articles permit cumulative voting. The opinion receiving the greatest number of votes resolves the challenge by applying the default plurality standard and upholding the election.
Pierre Poulin faces criminal charges and objects when an expert relies on a non-testifying lab's DNA profile. The Supreme Court splits on whether the Confrontation Clause bars the testimony. The opinion with the most votes holds that the profile served only as a basis for the expert's independent conclusion and therefore did not violate the Clause.
Parker Phillips sues federal agents for an alleged unlawful search. The appellate panel fragments on whether an implied damages action exists. The opinion attracting the largest bloc of votes supplies the controlling rationale that permits the claim to proceed.
On the morning of November 26, 1965, agents of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics entered Webster Bivens's apartment in the Bronx. The agents broke open the door, handcuffed Bivens in front of his wife and young children, and thoroughly searched the apartment. They then transported Bivens to the federal courthouse in Brooklyn, where he was interrogated, booked, and subjected to a visual strip search. Several days later Bivens was released on his own recognizance, and he was never indicted or prosecuted for any offense. Bivens filed suit in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York against the six agents in their individual capacities. His complaint sought fifteen thousand dollars in damages from each agent and alleged that the arrest and search were effected without a warrant, that unreasonable force was employed, and that the arrest was made without probable cause. Bivens claimed to have suffered great humiliation, embarrassment, and mental suffering as a result of the agents' conduct. The District Court dismissed the complaint on the ground that it failed to state a cause of action. The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit affirmed the dismissal. The Supreme Court of the United States granted certiorari to review the judgment.
View casePamela Phillips contests a state parental-consent statute. The court divides on the proper standard of review. The opinion receiving the most votes reaffirms that an adequate judicial bypass preserves the statute's constitutionality.
The Pennsylvania Abortion Control Act of 1982, as amended in 1988 and 1989, established several requirements governing the performance of abortions within the Commonwealth. The Act required a woman seeking an abortion to provide informed consent after receiving specific information from a physician or counselor at least twenty-four hours before the procedure. It mandated that a minor obtain the informed consent of one parent, subject to a judicial bypass option. It further required a married woman to sign a statement confirming that she had notified her husband of her planned abortion, unless certain exceptions applied. The Act also imposed reporting obligations on facilities providing abortion services and defined a medical emergency exception to the various requirements. Before any of these provisions took effect, the petitioners brought suit in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. The petitioners were five abortion clinics and one physician representing himself as well as a class of physicians who provide abortion services. They sought declaratory and injunctive relief and challenged each provision as unconstitutional on its face. The District Court entered a preliminary injunction. After conducting a three-day bench trial, the District Court held all the provisions unconstitutional and entered a permanent injunction against their enforcement by Pennsylvania. The Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit affirmed in part and reversed in part. It adopted the District Court's factual findings and legal analysis except with respect to the spousal notification requirement. The Court of Appeals upheld the spousal notification requirement as constitutional and applied the undue burden standard in evaluating the provisions. The Supreme Court granted certiorari to consider the constitutionality of the challenged provisions of the Pennsylvania statute.
View casePhilip Powell seeks recognition of an out-of-state marriage. The panel splits on the scope of liberty and equality protections. The opinion with the greatest support announces the rule that states must license and recognize same-sex marriages.
The petitioners were fourteen same-sex couples and two men whose same-sex partners were deceased. They lived in Michigan, Kentucky, Ohio, and Tennessee. Those states defined marriage as a union between one man and one woman under their constitutions and statutes. The petitioners filed suits in federal district courts in their home states. They sought marriage licenses or recognition of marriages lawfully performed elsewhere. James Obergefell and John Arthur traveled from Ohio to Maryland to marry aboard a medical transport plane because Arthur suffered from ALS; Obergefell later sought to be listed as surviving spouse on Arthur's death certificate. April DeBoer and Jayne Rowse, Michigan nurses, adopted three children but could not both serve as legal parents under state adoption rules. Army Reserve Sergeant Ijpe DeKoe and Thomas Kostura married in New York before DeKoe's deployment to Afghanistan and later settled in Tennessee. Each district court ruled in the petitioners' favor. The respondents appealed. The Sixth Circuit consolidated the cases and reversed the district court judgments. The petitioners sought certiorari, which the Supreme Court granted. Same-sex couples had begun establishing families after substantial cultural and political developments in the late twentieth century. Earlier litigation had addressed the legal status of gays and lesbians, including challenges that reached the Supreme Court in Bowers v. Hardwick and Lawrence v. Texas.
View casePriya Prasad objects to admission of a witness's prior statement. The court fragments on whether the statement is testimonial. The opinion drawing the most votes holds that the Confrontation Clause requires cross-examination of the declarant.
On August 5, 1999, Michael Crawford stabbed Kenneth Lee in the torso during a confrontation at Lee's apartment. Crawford and his wife Sylvia had gone there after Sylvia alleged that Lee had attempted to rape her several weeks earlier. Lee was taken to the hospital and later died from his wounds. Police arrested both Crawford and Sylvia that night. Detectives gave Miranda warnings and interrogated Sylvia twice at the station house. In her recorded statement Sylvia initially denied involvement but eventually admitted she had led Crawford to Lee's apartment and had seen the stabbing. Crawford also gave police a statement describing the events and his belief that Lee may have reached for something before the stabbing. At trial Crawford asserted self-defense, but Sylvia did not testify because of Washington's marital privilege. The State offered Sylvia's tape-recorded statement as evidence that the stabbing was not in self-defense and invoked the hearsay exception for statements against penal interest. The trial court admitted the statement after finding it bore particularized guarantees of trustworthiness. The jury convicted Crawford of assault. The Washington Court of Appeals reversed after applying a nine-factor test and concluding the statement lacked sufficient indicia of reliability. The Washington Supreme Court reinstated the conviction. It determined that Sylvia's statement interlocked with Crawford's statement and therefore bore adequate guarantees of trustworthiness, noting that both accounts were ambiguous on whether Lee had possessed a weapon. The United States Supreme Court granted certiorari.
View caseThe opinion that attracts the largest number of votes becomes the plurality opinion and supplies the judgment of the court. Judges who agree with the result but not the reasoning may write separately.
A plurality opinion binds when later courts treat it as authoritative on the points it resolves. Its precedential weight depends on how subsequent majorities apply its reasoning.
A majority opinion commands five or more votes on a nine-member court. A plurality opinion receives the most votes but falls short of a majority, so it decides the case without the full force of a majority rationale.
Yes. When the plurality's reasoning later garners majority support in subsequent cases, the rule it announced becomes settled precedent.
…that the Framers thought exceptions would apply even to prior testimony. Cf. Lilly v. Virginia , 527 U. S. 116, 134 (1999) (plurality opinion) ("[A]ccomplices' confessions that inculpate a criminal defendant are not within a firmly rooted exception to the hearsay rule"). IV Our case law has been largely consistent…