Supreme Court Makes Revisions Public

In 2014, Harvard Law professor Richard J. Lazarus noticed that the Supreme Court was routinely revising its decisions, altering them without public notice, sometimes months or years after they were issued. In response, the Court said that this would be the first year it would disclose after the fact changes to its decisions. As of the last day of this term, Justice Stephen G. Breyer made a change to one of the most quoted parts of a ruling striking down a Texas abortion law. When the Court ruled on June 27, Breyer said that “neither of these provisions offers medical benefits sufficient to justify the burdens upon access to that each imposes.” At the end of the Court’s final day this term, Breyer had changed “offers” to “confers.” He changed four other passages that same day, expanding or clarifying other rulings. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg altered language in a ruling to fix an error, which was pointed out by deputy solicitor general Michael R. Dreeben. “The court’s new procedure underscores the many advantages of greater transparency,” Lazrus told the New York Times. “By providing notice that it was contemplating a correction in an opinion, the court made it possible for others to weigh in about possible competing considerations.” However, the Court’s site does not publicly post briefs like Dreeben’s.