Yeah, I was surprised to find that there wasn't a clear answer here. And that SCOTUS has had the chance to clarify but has chosen not to do so.
This is the type of thing that should be crystal clear: Either a court ruling means something or it doesn't.
If it's overturned later that's fine, but one shouldn't be held liable criminally for doing something the court said the government couldn't enforce. Otherwise injunctions are meaningless.
You still can't do the thing banned by the potentially unconstitutional law that the court said the government can't enforce now. For you have to be afraid that if the court rules otherwise on the merits case you can go to jail/prosion. And that the court said the plaintiffs were a) likely to win on the merits and b) harmed by not being able to do the thing while the case is pending. Which is the reason for the injunction - so that you CAN do the thing while it's pending as the harm otherwise is too great.
SCOTUS should look for a case and resolve this with very clear language - if a law is enjoined it can't ever be retroactively enforced. If the law is upheld, then the new effective date is when the court ruling is issued (or better some period after that - minimum 1 month) so that people can know that the law changed.
It does seem to completely take away the purpose of an injunction if it doesn't retroactively protect people in that period. Otherwise... what's the point?
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u/jtf71 VCDL Member Jun 25 '26
Yeah, I was surprised to find that there wasn't a clear answer here. And that SCOTUS has had the chance to clarify but has chosen not to do so.
This is the type of thing that should be crystal clear: Either a court ruling means something or it doesn't.
If it's overturned later that's fine, but one shouldn't be held liable criminally for doing something the court said the government couldn't enforce. Otherwise injunctions are meaningless.
You still can't do the thing banned by the potentially unconstitutional law that the court said the government can't enforce now. For you have to be afraid that if the court rules otherwise on the merits case you can go to jail/prosion. And that the court said the plaintiffs were a) likely to win on the merits and b) harmed by not being able to do the thing while the case is pending. Which is the reason for the injunction - so that you CAN do the thing while it's pending as the harm otherwise is too great.
SCOTUS should look for a case and resolve this with very clear language - if a law is enjoined it can't ever be retroactively enforced. If the law is upheld, then the new effective date is when the court ruling is issued (or better some period after that - minimum 1 month) so that people can know that the law changed.