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The Occasional Left-Right Sotomayor-Gorsuch Alliance on Liberty-Related Cert. Opinions

Eugene Volokh | 10.27.2026 8:01 AM

The Supreme Court is asked to review several thousand cases each year. It agrees to review fewer than 1% of them. It takes four votes of the nine to decide to review a case. (The grant of review is generally called a "grant of certiorari" or just a "cert. grant.")

Sometimes Justices write opinions dissenting from a denial of cert., arguing that the Court should have taken the case. And sometimes they write opinions respecting the denial of cert., explaining why it made sense to deny review in this case but noting that the Court ought to consider the question in future cases.

Such opinions are often solo opinions, and are sometimes signed by two or three Justices from the liberal or conservative wings of the........

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