Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/23pdf/22-451_7m58.pdf
Page Number: 15.0

Cite as:  603 U. S. ____ (2024) 

7 

Opinion of the Court 

601 U. S. ___ (2023); 598 U. S. ___ (2023).2 

II 
A 
Article III of the Constitution assigns to the Federal Ju-
diciary the responsibility and power to adjudicate “Cases” 
and “Controversies”—concrete disputes with consequences
for the parties involved.  The Framers appreciated that the
laws judges would necessarily apply in resolving those dis-
putes would not always be clear.  Cognizant of the limits of 
human language and foresight, they anticipated that “[a]ll
new laws, though penned with the greatest technical skill,
and  passed  on  the  fullest  and  most  mature  deliberation,” 
would  be  “more  or  less  obscure  and  equivocal,  until  their 
meaning” was settled “by a series of particular discussions
and adjudications.”  The Federalist No. 37, p. 236 (J. Cooke 
ed. 1961) (J. Madison).

The  Framers  also  envisioned  that  the  final  “interpreta-
tion of the laws” would be “the proper and peculiar province 
of the courts.”  Id., No. 78, at 525 (A. Hamilton).  Unlike the 
political branches, the courts would by design exercise “nei-
ther Force nor Will, but merely judgment.”  Id., at 523.  To 
ensure the “steady, upright and impartial administration of
the laws,” the Framers structured the Constitution to allow 
judges to exercise that judgment independent of influence 
from the political branches.  Id., at 522; see id., at 522–524; 
Stern v. Marshall, 564 U. S. 462, 484 (2011). 

This Court embraced the Framers’ understanding of the
judicial function early on.  In the foundational decision of 
Marbury v. Madison, Chief Justice Marshall famously de-
clared that “[i]t is emphatically the province and duty of the 
judicial department to say what the law is.”  1 Cranch 137, 

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2 Both petitions also presented questions regarding the consistency of 
the Rule with the MSA.  See Pet. for Cert. in No. 22–451, p. i; Pet. for 
Cert. in No. 22–1219, p. ii.  We did not grant certiorari with respect to 
those questions and thus do not reach them.