Oops: Seventh Circuit Recalls ‘Erroneously Issued’ Decision

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit sided with the federal government in a legal battle over the Affordable Care Act’s controversial “contraceptive mandate” – and then five minutes later, the court withdrew that decision. The court said only that the decision had been “erroneously issued.” After the order withdrawing the opinion was posted, the erroneously issued opinion disappeared, Bloomberg BNA reports. The ruling was a unanimous panel decision in favor of the U.S. government in Ozinga v. Burwell. “Could it be that the judges haven’t actually made up their minds yet? Maybe,” Kimberly Robinson writes for Bloomberg. “More likely, the opinion just needs some final edits.” That theory is upheld by at least one typographical error that Robinson spotted: an extra period at the end of a sentence.