Justiciability

Justiciability Article III, section 2 of the Constitution defines the categories of federal jurisdiction in terms of cases and controversies. This has led the Supreme Court to hold that federal courts may take jurisdiction only of “justiciable” disputes, that is, those “appropriate for judicial determination” (Aetna Life Insurance Co. v. Haworth, 1937, p. 240). In Aetna, Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes distinguished justiciable controversies from those merely hypothetical or moot. He stressed that there must be “a real and substantial controversy admitting of specific relief through a decree of a conclusive character” (p. 241). Justiciability is a conceptual umbrella covering several related doctrines or problems, including standing, mootness, and ripeness. It prohibited federal courts from rendering advisory opinions and, until the 1934 Declaratory Judgment Act (upheld in Aetna), declaratory judgments as well. It excludes collusive suits and political questions from federal jurisdiction.

Conceptual problems of justiciability helped frame the issues in the leading reapportionment case of Baker v. Carr (1962). Justice William J. Brennan for the majority held that the political question doctrine was mandated by the separation of powers within the federal system and was not a doctrine of federalism that prohibited federal courts from taking jurisdiction of litigation involving the political structure of state government. Thus suits challenging malapportionment were not banned by the justiciability requirement or the political question doctrine. Justice Felix Frankfurter in dissent insisted that apportionment litigation was innately nonjusticiable.

See also Judicial Power and Jurisdiction; Reapportionment Cases.

William M. Wiecek