Publication Date

6-4-2025

Journal

University of Illinois Law Review

Abstract

Shortly after returning to the presidency, Donald Trump terminated several independent federal officers, prompting legal action by employees who occupied government positions covered by statutory for cause removal protections long held constitutionally permissible and valid. Eventually, one or more suits alleging unlawful termination owing to the removal without cause will reach the Supreme Court to be decided on the merits. Having steadily narrowed the Humphrey’s Executor line of cases that insulate these officers, the Court now seems poised to displace that precedent entirely. In isolation, the overruling would mark a seismic doctrinal shift and major advance in legal conservatism's pursuit of a unitary executive empowered with complete authority over all segments of an acutely deconstructed regulatory apparatus. Considered in context, however, the overruling would be even more significant. Coming on the heels of a series of momentous overrulings that rank among the most consequential judicial acts this century, it would be shortsighted to view a decision by the Supreme Court to overrule Humphrey's Executor as simply effacing another decades-old precedent in constitutional law. It must also be understood as part of a continuing assault on stare decisis—leaving that doctrine on life support—an underappreciated casualty in the concerted and far-reaching effort to dismantle the jurisprudential foundations of a modern progressive constitutional order.

Successive terms marked by blockbuster opinions overruling decades of caselaw governing areas such as affirmative action in higher education, judicial deference to federal agency expertise, and the right to abortion and reproductive and sexual autonomy reveal a Court, diminished in the eyes of the public and commonly viewed as a partisan tribunal, shirking its duty to honor precedent—and with paradigm-shifting ramifications. This paper exposes the Court's oft-veiled disdain for one of the few constraints on the unelected body, arguing that the chasm between theory and constitutional practice suggests it may be time to reassess stare decisis to determine whether the longstanding doctrine can fairly and effectively contain a Court that seems hostile to legal precedent.

Volume

2025

First Page

49

Last Page

63

Publisher

University of Illinois College of Law

Keywords

Administrative Law, Civil Rights, Constitution, Constitutional Law, Constitutional Theory, Constitutional History, Courts, Democracy, Federalism, Jurisprudence, Separation of Powers

Disciplines

Administrative Law | Civil Rights and Discrimination | Constitutional Law | Courts | Jurisprudence | Law

Download

Share

COinS