Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/23pdf/23-719_19m2.pdf
Page Number: 15

Cite as:  601 U. S. ____ (2024) 

1 

SOTOMAYOR, KAGAN, and JACKSON, JJ., concurring in judgment 

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES 

_________________ 

No. 23–719 
_________________ 

DONALD J. TRUMP, PETITIONER v. 
NORMA ANDERSON, ET AL. 

ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE SUPREME COURT 
OF COLORADO 

[March 4, 2024] 

JUSTICE  SOTOMAYOR,  JUSTICE  KAGAN,  and  JUSTICE 

JACKSON, concurring in the judgment. 

“If it is not necessary to decide more to dispose of a case,
then it is necessary not to decide more.”  Dobbs v. Jackson 
Women’s  Health  Organization,  597  U. S.  215,  348  (2022) 
(ROBERTS, C. J., concurring in judgment).  That fundamen-
tal principle of judicial restraint is practically as old as our
Republic.  This Court is authorized “to say what the law is”
only because “[t]hose who apply [a] rule to particular cases 
. . .  must  of  necessity  expound  and  interpret  that  rule.” 
Marbury v. Madison, 1 Cranch 137, 177 (1803) (emphasis 
added).

Today, the Court departs from that vital principle, decid-
ing not just this case, but challenges that might arise in the
future.  In this case, the Court must decide whether Colo-
rado may keep a Presidential candidate off the ballot on the
ground that he is an oathbreaking insurrectionist and thus
disqualified from holding federal office under Section 3 of 
the  Fourteenth  Amendment.    Allowing  Colorado  to  do  so 
would, we agree, create a chaotic state-by-state patchwork,
at  odds  with  our  Nation’s  federalism  principles.    That  is 
enough to resolve this case.  Yet the majority goes further.
Even though “[a]ll nine Members of the Court” agree that
this independent and sufficient rationale resolves this case,