The first opinion the Court ever filed has a dissenting opinion. Dissent is a tradition of this Court... When someone is writing for the Court, he hopes to get eight others to agree with him, so many of the majority opinions are rather stultified.
About this quote
- What does it mean?
- Dissent is vital to the court; majority opinions often compromise to get agreement.
- In plain terms
- Disagreeing is a key tradition; main opinions get watered down to agree.
- What can you take from it?
- Dissent keeps the court honest and prevents groupthink.
Where it applies
Putting it to work
Questions to consider
- Is dissent always valuable?
- How do you handle disagreement?
Another view
Too much dissent can slow decision-making processes.
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