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Page Number: 69

8 

JUNE MEDICAL SERVICES L. L. C. v. RUSSO 

THOMAS, J., dissenting 

When  a  plaintiff  sought  to  vindicate  a  private  right,
“courts  historically  presumed  that  the  plaintiff  suffered  a 
de facto injury merely from having his personal, legal rights 
invaded.”  Spokeo,  supra,  at  ___  (THOMAS,  J.,  concurring)
(slip op., at 2).  But a plaintiff generally “need[ed] to have a
private interest of his or her own to litigate; otherwise, no 
sufficient interest [was] at stake on the plaintiff’s side, and 
the clash of interests necessary for a ‘Case’ or ‘Controversy’ 
[did]  not  exist.”  Woolhandler  &  Nelson,  supra,  at  723. 
Thus, 19th-century judges uniformly refused to “listen to an
objection made to the constitutionality of an act by a party
whose  rights”  were  not  at  issue.  Clark,  176  U. S.,  at  118 
(internal quotation marks omitted); see also, e.g., Tyler, 179 
U. S., at 406–407; Supervisors v. Stanley, 105 U. S. 305, 311 
(1882); United States v. Ferreira, 13 How. 40, 51–52 (1852); 
Owings v. Norwood’s Lessee, 5 Cranch 344, 348 (1809) (Mar-
shall, C. J.); In re Wellington, 33 Mass. 87, 96 (1834) (Shaw, 
C. J.).2 

Moreover,  it  was  not  enough  for  a  plaintiff  to  allege 
damnum—i.e.,  real-world  damages  or  practical  injury—if
the  law  he  was  challenging  did  not  violate  a  legally  pro-
tected interest of his own.  At common law, this sort of “fac-
tual harm without a legal injury was damnum absque inju-
ria  and  provided  no  basis  for  relief.”    Hessick,  Standing,
Injury in Fact, and Private Rights, 93 Cornell L. Rev. 275,
280–281 (2008).  As Justice Dodderidge explained in 1625,
“injuria & damnum are the two grounds for the having [of] 
—————— 

2 Common-law  courts’  recognition  of  prochain  ami  or  “next  friend”
standing  is  not  inconsistent  with  this  point.    In  those  cases,  the  third 
party was “no party to the suit in the technical sense” but rather served 
as “an officer of the court” and was legally “appointed by [the court] to
look  after  the  interests  of  [the  party  lacking  legal  capacity],”  who  re-
mained the real party in interest on “whom the judgment in the action 
[was] consequently binding.”  Blumenthal v. Craig, 81 F. 320, 321–322 
(CA3 1897) (internal quotation marks omitted).  In contrast, the real par-
ties in interest here—women seeking abortions in Louisiana—cannot be
bound by a judgment against abortionists and abortion clinics.