Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/20pdf/19-309_4f15.pdf
Page Number: 7.0

Cite as:  592 U. S. ____ (2020) 

5 

Opinion of the Court 

“injury in fact.”  And it consequently does not show stand-
ing.  Hollingsworth, supra, at 706; see also Lance v. Coff-
man, 549 U. S. 437, 439–441 (2007) (per curiam) (describing
this Court’s “lengthy pedigree” in refusing to serve as a fo-
rum for generalized grievances).

In other words, a plaintiff cannot establish standing by 
asserting an abstract “general interest common to all mem-
bers of the public,” id., at 440, “no matter how sincere” or 
“deeply committed” a plaintiff is to vindicating that general 
interest  on  behalf  of  the  public,  Hollingsworth,  supra,  at 
706–707.  Justice Powell explained the reasons for this lim-
itation.  He  found  it  “inescapable”  that  to  find  standing 
based upon that kind of interest “would significantly alter 
the  allocation  of  power  at  the  national  level,  with  a  shift
away  from  a  democratic  form  of  government.”    United 
States v. Richardson, 418 U. S. 166, 188 (1974) (concurring 
opinion).  He added that “[w]e should be ever mindful of the 
contradictions that would arise if a democracy were to per-
mit general oversight of the elected branches of government 
by a nonrepresentative, and in large measure insulated, ju-
dicial  branch.”  Ibid.;  see  also  Schlesinger  v.  Reservists 
Comm. to Stop the War, 418 U. S. 208, 222 (1974); Warth v. 
Seldin,  422  U. S.  490,  500  (1975).    Cf.  Federal  Election 
Comm’n v. Akins, 524 U. S. 11, 21–25 (1998) (finding stand-
ing where a group of voters suffered concrete, though wide-
spread,  harm  when  they  were  prevented  from  accessing
publicly disclosable voting-related material). 

B 
We  here  must  ask  whether  Adams  established  that,  at 
the  time  he  filed  suit,  Delaware’s  major  party  provision
caused him a concrete, particularized “injury in fact” over
and above the abstract generalized grievance suffered by all 
citizens of Delaware who (if Adams is right) must live in a 
State subject to an unconstitutional judicial selection crite-