Please note that SCOTUS Outside Opinions constitute the views of outside contributors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of SCOTUSblog or its staff.

In recent years, the Supreme Court has gradually abandoned an idea – the separation of powers – that the Framers thought was vital to the preservation of liberty. Instead, the court seems to have been captured by a different – and, I would argue, contrary – idea: a strong presidential system supported by a concept known as the “unitary executive,” which advocates that the president has total authority over the executive branch.

In their petitions for review, litigants spell out – in detail – why the Supreme Court should take up their case. These petitions can cover a wide range of topics, but many of them include a lengthy discussion of what is known as a circuit split – that is, a disagreement between the federal courts of appeals – on the legal issue on which they are asking the court to weigh in. Why? Circuit splits are among the top factors that the court considers when determining whether to grant review.

Circuit splits themselves, however, come in a variety of forms. Splits can be messy or clean. Percolating or persistent. Old or new. Indeed, there is sometimes controversy on whether a circuit split even exists in the first place.

Part of grabbing the Supreme Court’s attention is thus deciding what characteristics to play up and when – hence, the art of the circuit split.

Please note that SCOTUS Outside Opinions constitute the views of outside contributors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of SCOTUSblog or its staff.

In April, the Supreme Court will hear Sripetch v. Securities and Exchange Commission. This case has gotten less attention than many other cases this term. But its outcome could have significant consequences for the Securities and Exchange Commission, one of the country’s most influential and powerful federal agencies, by limiting its discretion to punish wrongdoers and therefore reining in some of this agency’s considerable – and more controversial – authority.

Somewhat to our surprise, one of the most popular features of the SCOTUStoday newsletter (which you should sign up for, if you haven’t already) has turned out to be the SCOTUS Quotes.

Although we didn’t include these in the first few editions of SCOTUStoday, since Oct. 6 we’ve brought you around 80 such quotations, mostly consisting of remarks made by Supreme Court justices either at oral argument or in their opinions.

In general, the quotes we’ve used fall into two buckets: (1) humor from the bench or (2) discussion of a justice’s legal philosophy. Without further ado, here are a few of our favorites from both categories.

A Republican member of Congress, a group of voters, and New York election officials asked the Supreme Court to allow the state to proceed with the 2026 elections using its existing congressional map. This followed an order by a state court barring New York from using the map, and requiring the state to redraw the map because, according to the state court, it diluted the votes of Blacks and Latinos in the only congressional district in New York City represented by a Republican, Rep. Nicole Malliotakis. Malliotakis told the justices that the state court’s decision would require the state “to adopt an unconstitutional racial gerrymander” – that is, to sort voters based on race. Peter Kosinski, a Republican co-chair of the state’s board of elections, echoed Malliotakis’ concerns, telling the court that if it does not put the lower court’s ruling on hold “by February 23, 2026, New York’s congressional elections will be thrown into chaos and uncertainty.”

The district at the center of the dispute is New York’s 11th Congressional District, which is based on Staten Island but also extends into parts of southern Brooklyn. In October 2025, a group of voters went to state court, where they argued that the district’s boundaries violated the state’s constitution by diluting the votes of Black and Latino voters, who now make up approximately 30% of the population of Staten Island, while the population of white voters has dropped to 56%. Specifically, they contended, the district’s boundaries did not give its black and Latino residents an equal opportunity to elect a representative of their choice.