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Page Number: 51

4 

LOPER BRIGHT ENTERPRISES v. RAIMONDO 

GORSUCH, J., concurring 

632, 98 Eng. Rep. 1277, 1279 (K. B. 1777).  By discarding
aberrational rulings and pursuing instead the mainstream
of past decisions, he observed, the common law tended over 
time to “wor[k] itself pure.” Omychund v. Barker, 1 Atk. 22, 
33, 26 Eng. Rep. 15, 23 (Ch. 1744) (emphasis deleted).  Re-
flecting similar thinking, Edmund Burke offered five prin-
ciples  for  the  evaluation  of  past  judicial  decisions:  “They
ought to be shewn; first, to be numerous and not scattered
here  and  there;—secondly,  concurrent  and  not  contradic-
tory and mutually destructive;—thirdly, to be made in good 
and constitutional times;—fourthly, not to be made to serve 
an  occasion;—and  fifthly,  to  be  agreeable  to  the  general
tenor of legal principles.”  Speech of Dec. 23, 1790, in 3 The 
Speeches  of  the  Right  Honourable  Edmund  Burke  513
(1816).

Not only did different decisions carry different weight, so 
did different language within a decision.  An opinion’s hold-
ing  and  the  reasoning  essential  to  it  (the  ratio  decidendi)
merited  careful  attention.  Dicta,  stray  remarks,  and  di-
gressions warranted less weight.  See N. Duxbury, The In-
tricacies  of  Dicta  and  Dissent  19–24  (2021)  (Duxbury).
These were no more than “the vapours and fumes of law.” 
F.  Bacon,  The  Lord  Keeper’s  Speech  in  the  Exchequer
(1617), in 2 The Works of Francis Bacon 478 (B. Montagu
ed. 1887) (Bacon).

That is not to say those “vapours” were worthless.  Often 
dicta  might  provide  the  parties  to  a  particular  dispute  a 
“fuller  understanding  of  the  court’s  decisional  path  or  re-
lated areas of concern.”  B. Garner et al., The Law of Judi-
cial Precedent 65 (2016) (Precedent).  Dicta might also pro-
vide  future  courts  with  a  source  of  “thoughtful  advice.” 
Ibid.  But future courts had to be careful not to treat every
“hasty expression . . . as a serious and deliberate opinion.” 
Steel  v.  Houghton,  1  Bl.  H.  51,  53,  126  Eng.  Rep.  32,  33 
(C. P.  1788).  To  do  so  would  work  an  “injustice  to  [the] 
memory” of their predecessors who could not expect judicial