Federal Court's Injunction Against Birthright Citizenship Executive Order Can't Have Country-Wide Effect : US Supreme Court

The Supreme Court of the United States' decision to partially stay the District Court's 'universal injunction' against the USA President Donald Trump's Executive Order No. 14160 ending birthright citizenship has sent Indian immigrants or those on temporary visas into a state of limbo. In doing so, the Supreme Court observed that federal courts do not have the power to grant universal injunctions over-reaching the Executive's authority. However, the decision states that the Executive Order shall not come into effect, "until 30 days after the date" of the court's opinion and the lower courts will continue to deal with the matter.As soon as Trump was sworn in as the US President, for the second time, on January 20 this year, he issued executive orders, including Executive Order No. 14160, ending the birthright citizenship granted to those born on US soil, with effect from February 20. It will not affect US citizen, Green card holder, or member of the US military. Neither will it affect children born before the effective date of the order.Three separate suits were filed by 7 individuals, 2 immigrant rights organisations and 22 States challenging the Executive Order as violating the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution. In each case, the District Court granted universal injunctions barring officials from applying the order to anyone. It held that the Executive Order, which attempts to alter the Constitution's express conferral of citizenship on all who are born in this Nation, likely violates the Constitution.Thereafter, the Court of Appeal denied the Government's request for a stay, against which emergency applications seeking a partial stay were filed.Universal Injuctions likely exceed equitable authority: MajorityBy a 6-3 ruling on June 27, the US Supreme Court in TRUMP v. CASA held that "universal injunctions likely exceed the equitable authority that Congress has given to federal courts". In the majority judgment authored by Justice Amy Coney Barrett and joined by Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Justice Clarence Thomas, Justice Samuel A Alito, Justice Neil M. Gorsuch and Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh, the Court observed that federal courts do not exercise general oversight of the Executive Branch. It said that federal courts only "resolve cases and controversies consistent with the authority Congress has given them". It said:"When a court concludes that the Executive Branch has acted unlawfully, the answer is not for the court to exceed its power, too. The Government's applications for partial stays of the preliminary injunctions are granted, but only to the extent that the injunctions are broader than necessary to provide complete relief to each plaintiff with standing to sue."It further said that a universal injunction can be justified only as an exercise of equitable authority, yet Congress has granted federal courts no such power. It said that the lower courts shall move expeditiously to ensure that, with respect to each plaintiff, the injunctions comport with this rule and otherwise comply with principles of equity. "The injunctions are also stayed to the extent that they prohibit executive agencies from developing and issuing public guidance about the Executive's plans to implement the Executive Order," it added.The majority relies upon the practice of the High Court of Chancery in England, that the remedial power of the federal courts is limited to granting “complete relief ” to the parties. Referring to the English judgment, the majority observed that neither universal injunction nor any analogous form of relief was available in the High Court of Chancery in England at the time of the founding. Countering the decision rendered by the minority bench, the majority said:"Faced with this timeline, the principal dissent accuses us of “misunderstand[ing] the nature of equity” as being “fr[ozen] in amber . . . at the time of the Judiciary Act.” Post, at 29 (opinion of SOTOMAYOR, J.). Not so. We said it before, see supra, at 5, and say it again: “[E]quity is flexible.”...At the same time, its “flexibility is confined within the broad boundaries of traditional equitable relief.” A modern device need not have an exact historical match, but under Grupo Mexicano, it must have a founding-era antecedent. And neither the universal injunction nor a sufficiently comparable predecessor was available from a court of equity at the time of our country's inception. Because the universal injunction lacks a historical pedigree, it falls outside the bounds of a federal court's equitable authority under the Judiciary Act".Dissenting OpinionsThe minority ruling led by Justice Sonia Maria Sotomayor, joined by Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson and Justice Elena Kagan, has sharply dissented against the majority's opinion.Justice Sotomayor's fierce dissent warns of the threat that looms over the constitutional rights of Americans. She says: "No right is safe in the new legal regime the Court creates. Today, the threat is to birthright...

Federal Court's Injunction Against Birthright Citizenship Executive Order Can't Have Country-Wide Effect : US Supreme Court

Gursimran Kaur Bakshi

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