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Page Number: 32

8 

UNITED STATES v. HANSEN 

THOMAS, J., concurring 

justified it “solely by reference to” yet another layer of “pol-
icy considerations and value judgments” about “what serves 
the public good.”  Id., at ___–___ (slip op., at 3–4).  As the 
debate  over  the  federal  council  of  revision  demonstrates, 
this  approach  is  fundamentally  inconsistent  with  judicial 
duty. 
  This case demonstrates just how far courts have drifted 
from their original station of adjudicating the rights of the 
parties before them in accordance with law.3  In an appro-
priate case, we should carefully reconsider the facial over-
breadth doctrine. 

—————— 

3 The  facial  overbreadth  doctrine  is  but  one  manifestation  of  the 
Court’s larger drift away from the limited judicial station envisioned by 
the Constitution.  See J. Malcolm, Whatever the Judges Say It Is? The 
Founders and Judicial Review, 26 J. L. & Politics 1, 36–37 (2010).  Jus-
tices  have  long  noted  that  doctrines  tasking  judges  with  passing  upon 
the  policy  of  laws  in  the  abstract  resemble  the  council  of  revision  the 
Framers  rejected.    See,  e.g., Lewis  v.  New  Orleans,  415  U. S.  130,  136 
(1974) (Blackmun, J., joined by Burger, C. J., and Rehnquist, J., dissent-
ing) (overbreadth and vagueness doctrines); see also Trimble v. Gordon, 
430 U. S. 762, 778 (1977) (Rehnquist, J., dissenting) (suspect classifica-
tions under the Fourteenth Amendment); Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 
U. S.  479,  513–515  (1965)  (Black,  J.,  joined  by  Stewart,  J.,  dissenting) 
(substantive  due  process);  Goldberg  v.  Kelly,  397  U. S.  254,  273–274 
(1970) (Black, J., dissenting) (due process for welfare benefits); Saia v. 
New York, 334 U. S. 558, 571 (1948) (Jackson, J., dissenting) (review of 
time, place, and manner speech regulations).