Justice Thomas Seeks to Upend 1977 SCOTUS Ruling

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Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas on Thursday wrote that the high court should revisit a 47-year-old ruling that allows associations to bring a lawsuit on behalf of its members, saying the court in 1977 was “mistaken.”

Thomas was part of the Supreme Court’s 9-0 ruling on Thursday that said the plaintiffs in the case of the abortion pill mifepristone lacked legal standing to challenge the Food and Drug Administration’s approval of the drug.

SCOTUS ruled, in part, that the Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine chose the wrong forum to press its case against the FDA the pill.

In a concurring opinion, Thomas questioned the precedent set by SCOTUS in 1977 that allows for “third-party standing doctrine.” Thomas said the court should revisit its ruling in the 1977 case “Hunt v. Washington State Apple Advertising Comm’n.”

In that case, the Supreme Court ruled that associations could bring a suit on behalf of its members if certain conditions were met, Newsweek reported.

Thomas dismissed that in his concurring opinion.

“Applying these precedents, the Court explains that the doctors cannot establish third-party standing to sue for violations of their patients’ rights without showing an injury of their own,” Thomas wrote. “But, there is a far simpler reason to reject this theory: Our third-party standing doctrine is mistaken.

“As I have previously explained, a plaintiff cannot establish an Article III case or controversy by asserting another person’s rights. So, just as abortionists lack standing to assert the rights of their clients, doctors who oppose abortion cannot vicariously assert the rights of their patients.”

Further, Thomas wrote: “I am particularly doubtful of associational-standing doctrine because the Court has never attempted to reconcile it with the traditional understanding of the judicial power. Instead, the Court departed from that traditional understanding without explanation, seemingly by accident. To date, the Court has provided only practical reasons for its doctrine.”