Court Opinion

ID: 9433282
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:39:43.138173+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:23:40.420221
License: Public Domain

*434Justice Souter,
concurring.
In Part I of his dissenting opinion, Justice Stevens makes a persuasive argument that, absent a rule to the contrary, district judges have an “inherent authority” to enter a judgment of acquittal, although, for the reasons offered by the majority, ante, at 426,1 am not persuaded that this inherent authority extends to the power to act sua sponte to grant a judgment of acquittal after the jury has returned a verdict. In any event, I accept the received view that inherent power generally is subject to legislative abrogation, see Bank of Nova Scotia v. United States, 487 U. S. 250, 254-255 (1988); ante, at 426, and although Congress’s power is not necessarily plenary, its limits are not implicated here. While there may be some point at which legislative interference with a court’s inherent authority would run afoul of Article III, see Chambers v. NASCO, Inc., 501 U. S. 32, 58 (1991) (Scalia, J., dissenting) (“Some elements of that inherent authority are so essential to ‘[t]he judicial Power,’ U. S. Const., Art. Ill, § 1, that they are indefeasible”), it is not seriously contended that Rule 29(c) is an unconstitutional interference with the court’s inherent authority. I therefore join the Court’s opinion.