Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/19pdf/18-1195_g314.pdf
Page Number: 86.0

Cite as:  591 U. S. ____ (2020) 

5 

SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting 

B 
As  another  dissenting  opinion  observes,  see  ante,  at  3 
(opinion of GINSBURG, J.), the Court sidesteps these obsta-
cles by asking a question that this case does not raise and 
that the Montana Supreme Court did not answer: whether 
by excluding “religious schools and affected families from [a 
scholarship]  program,”  Montana’s  no-aid  provision  was 
“consistent with the Federal Constitution,” ante, at 7 (ma-
jority opinion).  In so doing, the Court appears to transform
petitioners’ as-applied challenge into a facial one.  Ante, at 
10; see also ante, at 1 (THOMAS, J., concurring).

This approach lacks support in our case law.  The Court 
typically declines to read state-court decisions as impliedly
resolving  federal  questions,  especially  ones  not  raised  by 
the parties.  See, e.g., Adams v. Robertson, 520 U. S. 83, 88– 
89 (1997) (per curiam).  Indeed, to honor principles of com-
ity, this Court generally dismisses writs of certiorari from a
State’s highest court where, as is true here of the Court’s
bespoke inquiry, “the sole federal question” the Court seeks 
to decide was not “raised, preserved, or passed upon in the
state courts below.”  Cardinale v. Louisiana, 394 U. S. 437, 
438 (1969); see also Webb v. Webb, 451 U. S. 493, 499 (1981). 
That rule respects not only federalism, but also the sepa-
ration of powers.  Article III confines this Court’s authority
to  adjudicating  actual  “[c]ases”  or  “[c]ontroversies.”    See 
also Allen v. Wright, 468 U. S. 737, 750 (1984) (case-or-con-
troversy requirement reflects “the idea of separation of pow-
ers on which the Federal Government is founded”).  Federal 
courts thus lack power “to decide questions that cannot af-
fect the rights of litigants in the case before them” and may 
—————— 
Brief for Public Funds Public Schools as Amicus Curiae 5–11; Brief for 
Montana  Constitutional  Convention  Delegates  as Amici  Curiae 19–25. 
These supporters argued that it would be wrong to put taxpayer dollars 
to religious purposes and that it would invite unwelcome entanglement 
between church and state.  See, e.g., U. S. Const., Amdt. 1; Brief for Re-
spondents 20.