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The justice writing the opinion for the court will produce and circulate a draft opinion to the other justices. Each justice's law clerks may be involved in this phase. In modern Supreme Court history only a few justices, such as former Justice Antonin Scalia, have regularly written their own first drafts. [25]
A unanimous opinion is one in which all of the justices agree and offer one rationale for their decision. A majority opinion is a judicial opinion agreed to by more than half of the members of a court. A majority opinion sets forth the decision of the court and an explanation of the rationale behind the court's decision.
In the mid-20th century, it became customary for the members of the U.S. Supreme Court and many state supreme courts to end their dissenting opinions with a variation on the phrase "I respectfully dissent." In turn, the omission of the word "respectfully" or of the entire phrase altogether is now taken as a signal that the dissenting justice is ...
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In other courts, such as the Supreme Court of California, the same justice may write a majority opinion and a separate concurring opinion to express additional reasons in support of the judgment (which are joined only by a minority). [5] In some jurisdictions (e.g., California), the term may be abbreviated in certain contexts to conc. opn.
Opinion of the court: this is the binding decision of the Supreme Court. An opinion that more than half of the justices join (usually at least five justices, since there are nine justices in total; but in cases where some justices do not participate it could be fewer) is known as "majority opinion" and creates binding precedent in American law.
In modern practice, they are most commonly used in summary decisions that the Court resolves without full argument and briefing. [4] The designation is stated at the beginning of the opinion. Single-line per curiam decisions are also issued without concurrence or dissent by a hung Supreme Court (a 4–4 decision), when the Court has a vacant seat.
A majority opinion sets forth the decision of the court and an explanation of the rationale behind the court's decision. Not all cases have a majority opinion. At times, the justices voting for a majority decision (e.g., to affirm or reverse the lower court 's decision) may have drastically different reasons for their votes, and cannot agree on ...