When an old Supreme Court ruling is overturned by a new one, how is this explained philosophically? When a new SCOTUS ruling overturns an old one, what is the philosophical difference between the two rulings? It seems to me that there are two possible explanations; either the old ruling was a mistake and the new ruling should have been the answer all along, or both rulings were correct and what was Constitutional changed when the later ruling was made. I understand that these are, in practice, the same, but it is philosophically important. Can the Supreme Court be wrong, or are their rulings infallible, a bit like the Pope making Ex Cathedra statements?
The Supreme Court is infallible only in that their rulings are unchallengable, at least through any judicial process. Dissents often explain how the dissenter thinks a decision is not only wrong, but horribly misguided. Law review articles and other publications often criticize Court decisions, and sometimes influence later results. It is far from unheard of for a dissent to later be followed in an opinion overruling the previous decision. John Marshal Harlan I was known as the &quot;Great Dissenter&quot;, but many of his dissents were later adopted as governing law, including his famous dissent in Plessy v. Ferguson, 163 U.S. 537 (1896), the case that created the &quot;separate but equal&quot; doctrine overturned more than 50 years later in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, 347 U.S. 483 (1954). (The Justice is known as &quot;John Marshal Harlan I&quot; because his grandson, also named &quot;John Marshal Harlan&quot;, was a Justice during the mid 20th century. The grandson is known as &quot;John Marshal Harlan II' or just as &quot;Harlan II&quot;. Harlan II was significantly more conservative than his grandfather.) Supreme court decisions may be overruled because there has been a change in the constitution. An example is Barron v. Baltimore, 32 U.S. (7 Pet.) 243 (1833) which was undone by the ratification of the 14th amendment. This reason is rare, but particularly important. Decisions interpreting statutes can be altered or reversed if Congress or a state legislature changes the statute. Indeed sometimes a Court decision explicitly invites a legislative change. Not infrequently, however, such invitations are ignored by Congress. Supreme court decisions may be overturned when a later majority decides that the previous decision was simply wrong. A special case was Dred Scott v. Sandford, 60 U.S. (19 How.) 393 (1857). That decision held that blacks could never be citizens of the US, and was effectively overruled by the outcome of the US Civil War, and formally by the 13th and 14th amendments to the Constitution. A more usual example is the case of West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette, 319 U.S. 624 (1943) the case that held that a state could not make the flag salute and Pledge of Allegiance mandatory for school children. This overruled Minersville School District v. Gobitis, 310 U.S. 586 (1940), decided only three years before. In this case the opinion included what was in effect a point-by-point refutation of the Gobitis opinion, although it was not described as such. This angered Justice Frankfurter (author of the Gobitis opinion), who issued a dissenting opinion from the Barnette decision. Many prominent lawyers and legal scholars had challenged the Gobitis decision, and Gobitis had led to increased persecution of members of the Jehovah's Witnesses, the group whose members refused to say the pledge, considering that it was a form of idolatry. These facts influenced the rapid reversal of the Gobitis decision. Often an earlier decision is not directly overruled, but is distinguished. That is, the earlier opinion is said to still hold for its particular facts, but a new and different ruling applies to the different circumstances of a later case. When a number of yet later decisions follow the later case, the original can become effectively overruled, as there are no longer any circumstances in which it will be applied. Court opinions will often go into considerable detail on the legal reasoning which supports a decision that overrules a previous case. They do not commonly discuss the philosophy of the reasons for change. Some legal scholars and some Justices have used the Living Constitution theory to support change on the ground that what was constitutional many years or decades ago is no longer permissible as the constitution &quot;evolves and adapts to new circumstances even if the document is not formally amended&quot;. Others, particularly &quot;textualists&quot; and &quot;originalists&quot; strongly disapprove of this theory. This theory was expressed by Justice Holmes in the case of Missouri v. Holland 252 U.S. 416 (1920) with the words: With regard to that we may add that when we are dealing with words that also are a constituent act, like the Constitution of the United States, we must realize that they have called into life a being the development of which could not have been foreseen completely by the most gifted of its begetters. It was enough for them to realize or to hope that they had created an organism; it has taken a century and has cost their successors much sweat and blood to prove that they created a nation. The case before us must be considered in the light of our whole experience and not merely in that of what was said a hundred years ago. The treaty in question does not contravene any prohibitory words to be found in the Constitution. The only question is whether it is forbidden by some invisible radiation from the general terms of the Tenth Amendment. We must consider what this country has become in deciding what that amendment has reserved. In the Death Penalty cases the citation of &quot;evolving standards of decency&quot; from Trop v. Dulles, 356 U.S. 86 (1958) in Furman v. Georgia, 408 U.S. 238 (1972) was a version of Living Constitution theory. But it was not followed in later cases on he subject. US Supreme Court rulings are not strictly binding on future Supreme Court majorities if they truly believe the previous decision was wrong for whatever reason. This has happened many times. Some Justices believe fairly strongly in stare decisis, the principle that settled rules of law should not be changed, but even so they will vote to overturn a precedent when it seems clearly and seriously wrong. Prior cases are overturned with significant frequency. Justices routinely do their own research, and decide cases on grounds not urged by the lawyers who argue the case. Moreover, for significant cases, there are almost always amicus curiae (friend of the court) briefs from major organizations. These are very likely to point out precedents or lines of reasoning that the parties have missed. The chance of a modern SC case being wrongly decided because of poor advocacy (as a comment suggests) seems slight to me. Poor judging, yes, that does happen. The Barnette decision. was an example. There have also been changes of judicial philosophy. The death of &quot;substantive due process&quot; and &quot;freedom of contract&quot; in the 1930s is an example of that. But when consequences or legal theories are raised that were not previously considered, that can also be a reason to reverse a prior Supreme Court decision.
Why does the one country that promotes constitutional democracies above all others not have a judicial branch specifically for those matters? I know SCOTUS will hear these matters . . . I have had it mention that SCOTUS hears less than a hundred cases a year. Something which sounds incredibly low. A constitutional court profoundly limits the extent to which relief for violations of the constitution are judicially reviewable relative to the U.S. status quo. All courts from traffic court on up hear these matters and adjudicate constitutional issue in the status quo. It is also helpful to recognize that the U.S. Constitution regulates government conduct, not necessarily only though the device of determining that legislation is or is not constitutional. If a police officer stops you without having reasonable suspicion to do so, he has violated the U.S. Constitution, without regard to what the statutes of the state in question say. If evidence is seized without probable cause and this evidence is introduced in court over your objection in a criminal case, the government has violated the constitution and you are entitled (unless it was harmless error) to have your conviction vacated. If a tax collector seizes your property for unpaid taxes without first affording you due process to dispute their right to do so, the government has violated one of your constitutional rights. The Constitution imposes affirmative duties and obligations on the government, it does not merely invalidate laws enacted as unconstitutional. Most instances of constitutional adjudication involve government conduct and not the validity of government enacted statutes.
If an appellate court interprets a constitutional clause, that interpretation only has precedential weight as long as the clause (and other clauses it interacts with) go unchanged. Some aspects of the original interpretation might have some persuasive weight on the way the new clause is interpreted (for example, if the new clause uses language that the court previously used or interpreted). But other than taking potentially persuasive guidance from that kind of interaction, a new constitutional clause is interpreted de novo (anew, without deference to previous interpretations). An example of this can be found in State Board of Equalization v. Young's Market Co. 299 U.S. 59 (1936). The Supreme Court had to interpret the newly ratified 21st Amendment which ended prohibition. Prior to the Twenty-First Amendment, it would obviously have been unconstitutional to have imposed any fee for [the privilege of moving beer across a state border]. But, the 21st Amendment changed that (cleaned up): The amendment which prohibited the transportation or importation of intoxicating liquors into any state in violation of the laws thereof abrogated the right to import free, so far as concerns intoxicating liquors. The words used are apt to confer upon the state the power to forbid all importations which do not comply with the conditions which it prescribes.
The future prospects are negligible, and the present status of such influence is non-existent. In a few cases, you may find an appellate decision citing some statement from a reputable law review. Here is an article that addresses such influences on SCOTUS (which, the authors note, have decreased over time). However, you are describing a wingnut legal theory, and courts do not rely on wingnut legal theories, they rely on what the actual law is.
Your question slightly misrepresents what the article says: Yes, the judge denied the motion which led to the collapse of the case, he did not make a ruling on the substance of the case. The distinction is significant to my mind as the judge was using non-evidentiary knowledge (i.e. what he read in the paper) to make a decision on process; in this case a process that would have put a lot of people to a lot of inconvenience. It would not be proper for the judge to have used such knowledge to inform a judgement. It is also not clear from the article if the academic paper in question was actually introduced by the defendant as evidence. If that was the case then it is only right and proper for the judge to consider it. As to why a judge is allowed to read the news and a jury is not, I can offer several ideas: A judge must document their reasoning process in a judgement which is subject to review - if they were to make a decision based on matters not supported by the evidence then an appeals court could correct it. Alternatively, juries are specifically prohibited from revealing their reasoning process to anyone. Judges do their jobs for years, perhaps a whole career - to prohibit them from consuming media is a) unworkable and b) a serious impediment on their lifestyle. Juries are empaneled for weeks or months - such sacrifices are more reasonable. Judges are (supposedly) trained and impartial professionals who are more readily able to make the distinction between evidence and news. Newsworthy cases are relatively rare
As for SCOTUS being willing to overrule itself, here is a table of such cases, starting with Hudson v. Guestier 10 U.S. (6 Cr.) 281 (1810) which overturned Rose v. Himely, 8 U.S. (4 Cr.) 241 (1808) up to Ramos v. Louisiana, No. 18-5924 (U.S. Apr. 20, 2020) which overturned Apodaca v. Oregon, 406 U.S. 404 (1972) (plurality opinion) and Johnson v. Louisiana, 406 U.S. 366 (1972) (Powell, J., concurring). This is 234 cases since 1798, slightly above once a year. No idea what the rate is for the UK or Canada.
The case was appealed and taken by SCOTUS. Then the case became moot: Trump was banned from Twitter for life, his account permanently suspended. As the Twitter account that was the core of the controversy no longer exists, Trump can't block any accounts anymore. As Trump is disallowed from making a new account, it can't arise with the same fact pattern. Trump is no longer in office. The SCOTUS may only weigh in on live and active cases of controversy. The case is neither live nor active because it was rendered moot in January. As a result, it had to be dismissed, or the decision to take the case overturned. Speculating why they chose one over the other is moot, as there is no majority opinion given and the judges won't answer such questions.
Why does someone need to know? Supreme Court decisions are effective to all cases at trial or on direct appeal when decided, so long as the issue it resolves are raised in the trial court. Judges generally don't suspend cases because a case that could change the law is pending. If the decision comes out shortly after the trial, the judge can overturn the result in a post-trial motion. If the decision comes out later, the issue can be raised on appeal. A smart plaintiff raises favorable issues that could be decided in his or her favor in pending appellate cases to leave the door open for that possibility. If the law is unsettled, the judge makes a best guess about how the higher courts will resolve it and is effectively free to choose either outcome knowing that the result is uncertain. If there is binding precedent on an issue at the time, the judge must follow it, even if there is a likelihood that it could be reversed on appeal. People are presumed to know the law, but it's not possible to know what future decisions the Supreme Court of the USA will make. Therefore, the existing written precedents should be relied upon in their present form, and the case at trial should continue without delay. This kind of consideration is mostly relevant only in cases of &quot;qualified immunity&quot; and in certain kinds of federal habeas corpus petitions (which collaterally attack criminal convictions affirmed on direct appeal). In those cases, law enforcement conduct is not punished, and judicial decisions are not overturned, unless there was clearly established law at the time the decision was made that made the law enforcement conduct unconstitutional, or make the judicial decision a wrongly decided one. In all other contexts, what was believed to be the law at the time an action was taken, or a judicial decision was made, doesn't matter.