Luther v. Borden

In effect, the Supreme Court decided not to decide. It argued that it had no jurisdiction in this matter, because to decide would be to decide which Rhode Island government was the legitimate one. But, said the Court, the very nature of a court's power derives from the power of the government that sets it up. If courts could then turn around and invalidate the very governments that empowered them, the whole nature of political power would be in question.

Chief Justice Taney, writing the Court's majority opinion, explained that no court should take up what he called "political questions"--questions about who should be in power or what laws should be made. Rather, the Supreme Court and all other courts should take a narrower role, merely interpreting the laws made by the legislature and evaluating in that light the actions taken by the executive.

Taney's ruling was not particularly crucial in deciding the affairs of Luther, Dorr, or Rhode Island, which, as we have seen, were already settled by the time his decision was handed down. However, issues of the legitimacy of government were to become extremely important in the period that followed the Civil War. During Reconstruction, Congress passed many laws restricting who might vote or hold office in the former Confederate states--laws that were bitterly opposed by many people in those states. Because of the precedent set in Luther v. Borden, the Court was able to stay out of those conflicts.