The two most-conservative Supreme Court justices have launched a scathing rebuke of the rest of the court for refusing to hear a case involving 24 states.

Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito have sharply criticized the other Supreme Court judges for declining to hear a case called Alabama v. California.

Why It Matters

The case comes to the heart of “original jurisdiction”—the sole right of the Supreme Court to hear disputes between individual states.

On a broader level, Alabama v. California is an environmental case of huge importance, in which California and other states are trying to sue oil companies for alleged climate-change denial.

What To Know

California and four other Democrat-led states, Connecticut, Minnesota, New Jersey, and Rhode Island, are suing oil companies for what they say are decades of misleading climate denial.

Alabama and 18 other Republican-leaning states want to enter the case on the side of the oil companies.

In their written submission to the Supreme Court, these 19 states say that California and the other four states seek to “impose ruinous liability and coercive remedies on energy companies … based on out-of-state conduct with out-of-state effects,” for the purpose of placing a “global carbon tax on the traditional energy industry.”

On Monday, the Supreme Court majority said that Alabama and those other states would not be allowed to enter the case but did not offer any written explanation.

Thomas wrote a dissenting opinion, to which Alito also attached his name, and assailed the court majority for refusing to hear Alabama’s case.

What People Are Saying

In his dissenting opinion, Justice Clarence Thomas accused the Supreme Court majority of having an overly restrictive understanding of original jurisdiction—the constitutional provision through which only the Supreme Court can decide disputes between individual states.

“This Court has—essentially for policy reasons—assumed a power to summarily turn away suits between States,” he said.

“The Court today exercises that power to reject a suit involving nearly half the States in the Nation, which alleges serious constitutional violations,” Thomas wrote.

“The Court’s reluctance to accept jurisdiction in cases between the States is also troubling because this Court is the only court that can hear such cases,” Thomas added, in an opinion that was heavy with quotes from previous Supreme Court decisions.

“Accordingly, the Court today leaves the 19 plaintiff States without any legal means of vindicating their claims against the 5 defendant States.”

The court’s “assumption that it has ‘discretion to decline review’ in suits between States is ‘suspect’ at best,” Thomas wrote, quoting from the 2020 case of Arizona v. California.

“We should revisit this discretionary approach. Our exclusive original jurisdiction over suits between States reflects a determination by the Framers and by Congress about the need ‘to open and keep open the highest court of the nation’ for such suits, in recognition of the ‘rank and dignity’ of the States,” Thomas wrote, quoting from the 1884 case of Ames v. Kansas.

He concluded: “Because I would at least allow the plaintiff States to file their complaint, I respectfully dissent from the Court’s denial of leave to file.”

What Happens Next

The Supreme Court decision was a major win for California and the other four plaintiff states. Not only did the Supreme Court block Alabama and the other 18 Republican states from joining the case, but it also refused to hear an appeal from the oil companies, which were seeking to stop the lawsuits completely.

That means that the five plaintiff states can now continue with their lawsuits in what could be a case of massive environmental and legal significance.