Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/20pdf/19-840_6jfm.pdf
Page Number: 41.0

16 

CALIFORNIA v. TEXAS 

ALITO, J., dissenting 

C provides that a party is not obligated to comply with pro-
vision A if provision B is held to be unconstitutional.  Based 
on the plain text of this law, a party subject to provision A 
should be able to obtain relief from the enforcement of pro-
vision A if it can show that provision B is unconstitutional. 
To hold otherwise would be directly contrary to the statu-
tory  text.  But  the  Court’s  reasoning  would  make  such  a 
claim impossible.  The plaintiff would be thrown out of court 
at the outset of the case for lack of standing.

That cannot be right.  And if the Court really means to
foreclose all such claims from now on, that is a big change
because  we  have  repeatedly  heard  such  arguments  and
evaluated them on the merits.  See Lea, Situational Sever-
ability,  103  Va.  L. Rev.  735,  769  (2017)  (explaining  that 
similar “claims are a longstanding feature of American ju-
risprudence”). 

In Seila Law LLC v. Consumer Financial Protection Bu-
reau, 591 U. S. ___ (2020), a law firm resisted the CFPB’s
efforts to enforce a civil investigative demand.  The firm ar-
gued that (A) it was harmed by actions taken under statu-
tory provisions authorizing the Bureau to issue civil inves-
tigative demands; (B) the Bureau’s Director, under whose 
authority the demands had been issued, was protected by
an  unlawful  removal  restriction;  and  (C)  the  removal  re-
striction was inseverable from the investigative provisions. 
The Court did not decide the severability issue at the stand-
ing stage.  Instead, it properly treated severability as a mer-
its  issue,  held  that  the  removal  restriction  was  unlawful, 
and considered whether relief could be granted because the
investigative provisions were inseverable from the removal
restriction.  Id., at ___–___ (opinion of the Court) (slip op.,
at 11–30); id., at ___–___ (plurality opinion) (slip op., at 30– 
36).
  Indeed, the Seila Law Court had little trouble dismissing 
the same misguided approach to traceability that the ma-
jority adopts today.  The court-appointed amicus suggested