为什么金斯伯格反对罗诉韦德案

今天最高法院正式推翻了罗诉韦德案，很多人都在哀嚎从此女性不能堕胎了，都是最高法院老白男们的错，假如我们“臭名昭著”的露丝•金斯伯格大法官（Notorious RBG）还在就好了（或者假如她没那么恋栈，在奥巴马任内退下来而不是死在川普任上也行，当然这话不能大声说）。但很多当代女权主义者不了解的是，她们的偶像，伟大的女权主义大法官，金斯伯格，恰恰，是反对罗诉韦德案的……

1993年初，金斯伯格在纽约法学院的麦迪逊讲座做了一个演讲，从她自己几十年的法律从业经验谈了她对美国法律制度的理解，非常精彩。在演讲的第二部分她论证了为什么过于激进的判决反而会阻碍社会的进步，“经验告诉我们，教义的四肢如果成形的太快，可能会被证明是不稳定的”，在她看来，罗案就是这么一个判决。罗案“不够审慎”的判决超出了最高法院的职责，“没有邀请立法者进行对话。相反，它似乎完全是为了把球从立法者的场地上拿走”，结果反而团结了反对者，打断了原本正在自由化的堕胎法规进程，“相当长的一段时间内成功地将立法潮流转向相反的方向”。 这个充满洞见的演讲给她带来了意想不到的麻烦，因为就在几周后，克林顿打算提名她当大法官了。谁能想到，这样一位履历完美，为女权事业做出巨大贡献的人，在提名大法官时遇到的最大障碍，甚至是唯一障碍，恰恰来源于女权团体呢？历史真是有趣。

不管你同不同意金斯伯格的论证，你应该都会同意她反对的理由完全不涉及女性“应不应该”有权利堕胎。当然以金斯伯格的身份，没人敢说她不支持女性堕胎。但老白男阿利托就没这种幸运了。问题是，假如你去读一下阿利托撰写的多数意见，里面提到女性不应该堕胎了吗？他说的不是“我们的决定是，将堕胎权问题交还给这些（州）立法机构，它允许（赞同和反对）堕胎的双方妇女通过影响公众舆论、游说立法者、投票和竞选公职，来寻求影响立法进程。妇女并非没有选举权或政治权利。值得注意的是，登记投票和进行投票的女性比例，一直高于男性的比例。”吗？哦原来你没读过判决书啊……真不愧是你呢。

我并不是说如果金斯伯格还活着她会一块推翻罗案。从她晚年的访谈和对 Gonzales v. Carhart 的强烈反对来看，她大概会以尊重先例为由表示异议。毕竟罗案已经存在了近50年，所以阿利托在多数意见里也以极大的篇幅回应了这一观点。但不管怎样，它显然都与女性是否有权堕胎无关。

事实上罗案是一个极富教育意义的例子，有助于人们理解和思考司法分支的角色、法律的演化、规则的层次等等问题。女性是否有权堕胎是它最不相关的角度，但却是人们最热衷的。

回顾罗案这五十年，我们能学到什么呢？是保守派法院真讨厌？还是冲在社会运动最前面的史上最进步的沃伦法院其实耽误了我们五十年的时间，让一个本可以早早解决的事情延宕至今？不同人会有不同的看法，但假如你无法理解史上最杰出的女权主义大法官为什么也反对罗诉韦德案，那你的看法有价值的概率大概等于0吧？

为了让更多人能讨论到点子上，我借助 DeepL 草翻了一下金斯伯格的演讲，毕竟就像辉格说的：”宪政体制并不是文化中性的，许多守护着美国人自由的美德——比如对持枪权的热爱与执着——，在美国以外很少得到同情，世人对宪政这棵果树结出的果实大流口水，却常常对果树之根和它深植于其中的文化土壤懵然无知甚或嗤之以鼻，这样你就很难相信，他们仅仅依靠自己也同样能把果树种活养好。“

——译文的分割线——

Speaking in a Judicial Voice 以司法之声发言

Introduction 导言

The Madison Lecture series has exposed and developed two main themes: human rights and the administration of justice, particularly in our nation’s federal courts.¹ My remarks touch on both themes; I will speak first about collegiality in style, and next, about moderation in the substance of appellate decisionmaking. My views on these matters reflect experiences over a span of three decades. They have been shaped from my years as a law teacher beginning in the 1960s, through the 1970s when I helped to launch the American Civil Liberties Union’s Women’s Rights Project, and most recently during the nearly thirteen years I have had the good fortune to serve on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. What I hope to convey about courts, I believe, is in line with the founders’—Madison’s and Hamilton’s—expectation. As a preface, I will comment on that expectation.

麦迪逊系列讲座揭示并发展了两大主题：人权和司法行政，尤其是在我们国家的联邦法院。¹这两个主题在我的发言中都将涉及；首先我将谈论合议制的风格，然后谈论上诉决策实质上的温和性。我对这些问题的看法反映了三十年来的经验。这些观点的形成源于我从20世纪60年代开始的法律教师生涯，到20世纪70年代我帮助发起美国公民自由联盟的妇女权利项目，以及最近我有幸在美国哥伦比亚特区巡回上诉法院任职的近13年期间。我相信，我希望传达的关于法院的内容与国父——麦迪逊和汉密尔顿——的期望是一致的。作为序言，我将对这种期望进行评论。

James Madison’s forecast still brightens the spirit of federal judges. In his June 1789 speech introducing to Congress the amendments that led to the Bill of Rights, Madison urged:

If [a Bill of Rights is] incorporated into the Constitution, independent tribunals of justice will consider themselves in a peculiar manner the guardians of those rights; they will be an impenetrable bulwark . . . naturally led to resist every encroachment upon rights . . . stipulated for in the Constitution by the declaration of rights.²

詹姆斯-麦迪逊的预测仍然照亮着联邦法官的精神。在1789年6月的演讲中，麦迪逊向国会介绍了导致《权利法案》的修正案，他敦促说:

“如果[权利法案]被纳入宪法，独立的司法法庭将以一种特别的方式认为自己是这些权利的监护人；他们将成为一个坚不可摧的堡垒……自然会抵制每一个侵犯权利的行为……在宪法中通过权利宣言规定的权利。”²

Today’s independent tribunals of justice are faithful to that “original understanding” when they adhere to traditional ways courts have realized the expectation Madison expressed.

今天的独立司法法庭在坚持法院实现麦迪逊所表达的期望的传统方式时，忠实于这种 “原始理解”。

In The Federalist No. 78, Alexander Hamilton said that federal judges, in order to preserve the people’s rights and privileges, must have authority to check legislation and acts of the executive for constitutionality.³ But he qualified his recognition of that awesome authority. The judiciary, Hamilton wrote, from the very nature of its functions, will always be “the least dangerous” branch of government, for judges hold neither the sword nor the purse of the community; ultimately, they must depend upon the political branches to effectuate their judgments.⁴ Mindful of that reality, the effective judge, I believe and will explain why in these remarks, strives to persuade, and not to pontificate. She speaks in “a moderate and restrained” voice,⁵ engaging in a dialogue with, not a diatribe against, coequal departments of government, state authorities, and even her own colleagues.

在《联邦党人》第78篇中，亚历山大-汉密尔顿说，为了维护人民的权利和特权，联邦法官必须有权检查立法和行政部门的行为是否符合宪法。 ³但他对这一令人敬畏的权力进行了限定。汉密尔顿写道，从其职能的本质来看，司法部门将永远是政府中 “最不危险的 “部门，因为法官既没有掌握社会的剑，也没有掌握社会的钱包；最终，他们必须依靠政治部门来实现他们的判决。⁴ 考虑到这一现实，我相信，并将在这些评论中解释为什么，有效的法官会努力说服，而不是武断地说教。她以 “温和而克制的 “声音说话，⁵ 与政府的同级部门、州政府当局，甚至她自己的同事进行对话，而不是对他们进行抨击。

I spoke of the founders’ “original understanding” a moment ago, and that expression, as I comprehend it, bears clarification in this preface. In his 1987 foreword to The Evolving Constitution, the second collection of Madison Lectures, Norman Dorsen stressed, as Chief Justice John Marshall did in 1819, that our fundamental instrument of government is an evolving document, “an instrument ‘intended to endure for ages to come.’ ”⁶ Professor Dorsen quoted Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes’ 1934 rejection of the notion that “the great clauses of the Constitution must be confined to the interpretation which the framers, with the conditions and outlook of their time, would have placed upon them.”⁷ That understanding, as Professor Dorsen commented, has been and should remain common ground.⁸

我刚才谈到了建国者的 “原始理解”，而我所理解的这一表达方式值得在本序言中加以澄清。诺曼-多森在1987年为《麦迪逊讲座》第二辑《不断发展的宪法》撰写的前言中强调，正如首席大法官约翰-马歇尔在1819年所做的那样，我们的政府基本文书是一份不断发展的文件，”这份文书’旨在为未来的时代而存在’。”⁶ 多森教授引用了首席大法官查尔斯-埃文斯-休斯1934年反对的观点，即 “宪法的重要条款必须局限于制定者在当时的条件和前景下对其做出的解释。”⁷ 正如多森教授所评论的那样，这种理解一直是而且应该是共同的基础。⁸

In the recent decade and more of bicentennial celebrations, Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall reminded us that while the Constitution’s endurance is indeed something to celebrate, the framers had a distinctly limited vision of those who counted among “We the People.”⁹ Qualified voters when the nation was new bore more than a passing resemblance to the framers: the franchise was confined to property-owning adult white males, people free from dependence on others, and therefore considered trustworthy citizens, not susceptible to influence or control by masters, overlords, or supervisors.¹⁰ In 1787, only five of the thirteen states had abolished slavery, women did not count as part of the franchise-holding, politically active community in any state, and wealth qualifications severely limited voter eligibility even among white males.¹¹ In correspondence with a friend about the qualifications for voting in his home state of Massachusetts, patriot and second president John Adams elaborated:

在最近十多年和更多的二百周年纪念活动中，最高法院法官瑟古德-马歇尔提醒我们，虽然宪法的持久性确实值得庆祝，但制宪者对那些属于 “我们人民 “的人的看法明显有限。⁹ “国家刚成立时的合格选民与制宪者比较相似：选举权仅限于拥有财产的成年白人男性，他们不依赖他人，因此被认为是值得信赖的公民，不容易受到主人、领主或监督者的影响或控制。 ¹⁰ 1787年，13个州中只有5个州废除了奴隶制，妇女在任何州都不能算作拥有选举权、也不是政治上活跃的群体，而财富要求甚至在白人男性中也严重限制了选民资格。¹¹爱国者和第二任总统约翰-亚当斯在与一位朋友的通信中就其家乡马萨诸塞州的投票资格进行了阐述：

[I]t is dangerous to open so fruitful a source of controversy and altercation as would be opened by attempting to alter the qualifications of voters; there will be no end of it. New claims will arise; women will demand a vote; lads from twelve to twenty-one will think their rights not enough attended to; and every man who has not a farthing, will demand an equal voice with any other, in all acts of state. It tends to confound and destroy all distinctions, and prostrate all ranks to one common level. ¹²

试图改变选民的资格，会引起如此多的争论和争吵，这是很危险的；这种争论和争吵不会停止的。新的要求会出现；妇女会要求有投票权；12至21岁的年轻人会认为他们的权利没有得到足够的重视；每个没有钱的人都会要求在所有国家行为中享有与其他任何人平等的发言权。它倾向于混淆和破坏所有的区别，并使所有的等级降到一个共同的水平。¹²

Our second President notwithstanding, equalizing voices and destroying rank distinctions have been dominant concerns in recent generations and, as one would expect, the focus of several Madison Lectures.’ ¹³ Although the word “equal,” or “equality,” in relation to individual rights does not even appear in the original U.S. Constitution or in the first ten amendments that compose the Bill of Rights, ¹⁴ the equal dignity of individuals ideal is part of our constitutional legacy, even of the pre-Civil War original understanding, in this vital sense. The founding fathers rebelled against the patriarchal power of kings and the idea that political authority may legitimately rest on birth status. Their culture held them back from fully perceiving or acting upon ideals of human equality and dignity. Thomas Jefferson, for example, when President, told his Secretary of the Treasury: “The appointment of a woman to [public] office is an innovation for which the public is not prepared, nor am I. ‘ ¹⁵ But the founders stated a commitment in the Declaration of Independence to equality and in the Declaration and the Bill of Rights to individual liberty. Those commitments had growth potential. As historian Richard Morris has written, a prime portion of the history of the U.S. Constitution is the story of the extension (through amendment, judicial interpretation, and practice) of constitutional rights and protections to once-excluded groups: to people who were once held in bondage, to men without property, to Native Americans, and to women. ¹⁶

尽管第二任总统如是说，但平等的声音和摧毁等级的区别一直是近几代人的主要关注点，正如人们所期望的那样，这也是几个麦迪逊讲座的重点。¹³尽管与个人权利有关的 “平等的”或 “平等 “一词甚至没有出现在美国宪法原文或构成《权利法案》的前十条修正案中，¹⁴但个人的平等尊严理想是我们宪法遗产的一部分，尤其重要的是，它甚至是内战前的原始理解。开国元勋们反抗国王的宗法权力以及政治权力可以合法地建立在出生地位上的想法。他们的文化使他们无法充分认识到人类平等和尊严的理想，也无法据此行事。例如，托马斯-杰斐逊在担任总统时，对他的财政部长说 “任命妇女担任[公共]职务是一项创新，公众没有做好准备，我也没有做好准备。”¹⁵但创始人在《独立宣言》中表明了对平等的承诺，在《宣言》和《权利法案》中表明了对个人自由的承诺。这些承诺具有增长潜力。正如历史学家理查德-莫里斯（Richard Morris）所写的那样，美国宪法历史的主要部分是（通过修正案、司法解释和实践）将宪法权利和保护扩展到曾经被排斥的群体的故事：曾经被奴役的人、没有财产的人、美洲原住民和妇女。¹⁶

I. Collegiality in Appellate Decisionmaking 上诉判决的合议性

I turn now to the first of the two topics this lecture addresses—the style of judging appropriate for appellate judges whose mission it is, in Hamilton’s words, “to secure a steady, upright, and impartial administration of the laws.”¹⁷ Integrity, knowledge, and, most essentially, judgment are the qualities Hamilton ascribed to the judiciary.¹⁸ How is that essential quality, judgment, conveyed in the opinions appellate judges write? What role should moderation, restraint, and collegiality play in the formulation of judicial decisions? As background, I will describe three distinct patterns of appellate opinion-casting: individual, institutional, and in-between.¹⁹

我现在谈谈本讲座所讨论的两个主题中的第一个——适合上诉法官的审判风格，用汉密尔顿的话说，上诉法官的使命是 “确保稳定、正直和公正的法律管理。”¹⁷ 正直、知识，以及最重要的——判断力，是汉密尔顿赋予司法机构的品质。¹⁸ 上诉法官撰写的意见中如何传达这一基本品质——判断力？节制、克制和合议制在司法判决的制定中应发挥什么作用？作为背景，我将描述上诉法院意见铸造的三种不同模式：个人、机构和介于两者之间。¹⁹

The individual judging pattern has been characteristic of the Law Lords, who serve as Great Britain’s Supreme Court. The Lords sit in panels of five and, traditionally, have delivered opinions seriatim, each panel member, in turn, announcing his individual judgment and the reasons for it.²⁰

个人审判模式一直是上议院贵族法院——英国的最高法院的特点。上议院以五人小组的形式开庭，传统上是逐一发表意见，每个小组成员轮流宣布他的个人判决和理由。²⁰

In contrast to the British tradition of opinions separately rendered by each judge as an individual, the continental or civil law traditions typified and spread abroad by France and Germany call for collective, corporate judgments. In dispositions of that genre, disagreement is not disclosed. Neither dissent nor separate concurrence is published. Cases are decided with a single, per curiam opinion generally following a uniform, anonymous style.²¹

与英国的传统，即每个法官作为个人单独提出意见相反的是以法国和德国为代表，并传播到国外的大陆法系或民法法系传统。它们要求集体的、团体的判决。在这种类型的处置中，分歧是不被披露的。既不发表异议，也不发表单独的赞同意见。案件的判决通常采用统一的匿名风格，以单一的法庭意见为准。²¹

Our Supreme Court, when John Marshall became Chief Justice, made a start in the institutional opinion direction. Marshall is credited with establishing the practice of announcing judgments in a single opinion for the Court.²² The Marshall Court, and certainly its leader, had a strong sense of institutional mission, a mission well served by unanimity. Marshall was criticized, in those early days, for suppressing dissent. Thomas Jefferson complained: “An opinion is huddled up in conclave, perhaps by a majority of one, delivered as if unanimous, and with the silent acquiescence of lazy or timid associates, by a crafty chief judge, who sophisticates the law to his own mind, by the turn of his own reasoning.”²³

当约翰-马歇尔成为首席大法官时，我们的最高法院开始向机构意见的方向上起步。马歇尔被誉为建立了以单一意见宣布法院判决的做法。²² 马歇尔法院，当然还有其领导人，具有强烈的机构使命感，这种使命感通过一致意见得到很好的实现。在早期，马歇尔曾因压制异议而受到批评。托马斯-杰斐逊抱怨说：“狡猾的首席法官把在秘密会议中也许只是以一票胜出的观点包装成一致意见，在懒惰或胆小的同事的默许下，把自己的想法和推理包装成法律”²³ 。

But even Marshall, during his long tenure as Chief Justice, ultimately dissented on several occasions and once concurred with a separate opinion.²⁴ We continue in that middle way today. Our appellate courts generally produce a judgment or opinion for the court. In that respect, we bear some resemblance to the highly institution-minded civil law judges, although our judges individually claim authorship of most of the opinions they publish. In tune with the British or common law tradition, however, we place no formal limit on the prerogative of each judge to speak out separately.

但即使是马歇尔，在他长期担任首席大法官期间，最终也多次提出异议，并有一次以单独意见表示赞同。²⁴我们今天依然采用这样的中间道路。我们的上诉法院一般都会为法院做出判决或意见。在这一点上，我们与具有高度机构意识的大陆法系法官有一些相似之处，不过我们的法官会对他们发表的大多数意见以个人名义署名。然而，为了与英国或普通法传统保持一致，我们对每个法官单独发表意见的特权没有正式限制。

To point up the difference between individual and institutional modes of judging, I have drawn upon a 1989 letter from a civilian jurist.²⁵ The letter came from a member of the Conseil d’Etat, the illustrious body created by Napoleon that still serves, among other functions, as Supreme Administrative Court for France. The conseiller who wrote to me had observed, together with several of his colleagues, an appellate argument in the District of Columbia Circuit. The appeal was from a criminal conviction; the prime issue concerned the Fifth Amendment’s double jeopardy ban.²⁶ When the case was decided, I sent our French visitors copies of the slip sheet. It contained the panel’s judgment, and three opinions, one per judge. I paraphrase the conseiller’s reaction:

为了指出个人判断模式和机构判断模式之间的区别，我参考了一位民法法系法学家1989年的一封信。²⁵这封信来自于法国最高行政法院（Conseil d’Etat）的一位成员，这个由拿破仑创建的杰出机构，除其他职能外，仍然是法国的最高行政法院。给我写信的这位委员曾与他的几位同事一起观察了哥伦比亚特区巡回法院的一次上诉辩论。该上诉是针对一项刑事定罪的；主要问题涉及第五修正案的一罪不二审²⁶ 。它包含了陪审团的判决，以及三个意见，每个法官一个。这里我转述这位委员的反应：

The way the decision is given is surprising for us according to our standards. The discussion of theory and of the meaning of precedents is remarkable. But the divided opinions seem to me very far from the way a judgment should issue, particularly in a criminal case. The judgment of a court should be precise and concise, not a discourse among professors, but the order of people charged to speak in the name of the law, and therefore written with simplicity and clarity, presenting short explanations. A judgment that is too long indicates uncertainty. At the same time, it is very impressive for me to see members of a court give to the litigants and to the readers the content of their hesitations and doubts, without diminishing the credibility of justice, in which the American is so confident.²⁷

按照我们的标准，判决的方式对我们来说是令人惊讶的。对理论和先例的意义的讨论是引人注目的。但在我看来，这些分歧意见与判决书应该发布的方式相去甚远，尤其是在刑事案件中。法院的判决应该是精确和简洁的，不是教授之间的讨论，而是受命以法律的名义发言的人的命令，因此应该写得简单明了，提出简短的解释。一份太长的判决书表明了不确定性。 同时，看到法院的成员向诉讼当事人和读者介绍他们的犹豫和疑虑的内容，同时又不削弱美国人非常自信的司法的可信度，这给我留下了非常深刻的印象²⁷ 。

The conseiller seems at first distressed, even appalled, at our readiness to admit that legal judgments (including constitutional rulings) are not always clear and certain. In his second thought, however, the conseiller appears impressed, touched with envy or admiration, that our system of justice is so secure, we can tolerate open displays of disagreement among judges about what the law is. ²⁸

对于我们愿意承认法律判决（包括宪法判决）并不总是清晰和确定的，这位顾问起初似乎感到不安，甚至感到震惊。然而，在他的第二个想法中，顾问似乎对我们的司法系统如此安全，我们可以容忍法官之间对法律是什么的公开表现出的分歧印象深刻，并带有羡慕或钦佩之情。²⁸

But overindulgence in separate opinion writing may undermine both the reputation of the judiciary for judgment and the respect accorded court dispositions. Rule of law virtues of consistency, predictability, clarity, and stability may be slighted when a court routinely fails to act as a collegial body.²⁹ Dangers to the system are posed by two tendencies: too frequent resort to separate opinions and the immoderate tone of statements diverging from the position of the court’s majority.

但是，过度沉迷于单独撰写意见，可能会破坏司法机关的判决声誉和对法院判决的尊重。如果法院经常不作为一个合议机构行事，那么一致性、可预测性、明确性和稳定性等法治美德就会受到轻视。²⁹ 对该系统构成危险的是两种倾向：过于频繁地诉诸单独意见，以及在不同意多数意见时不恰当的语气。

Regarding the first danger, recall that “the Great Dissenter,” Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, in fact dissented less often than most of his colleagues.³⁰ Chief Justice Harlan F. Stone once wrote to Karl Llewellyn (both gentlemen were public defenders of the right to dissent): “You know, if I should write in every case where I do not agree with some of the views expressed in the opinions, you and all my other friends would stop reading my separate opinions.”³¹ In matters of statutory interpretation, Justice Louis D. Brandeis repeatedly cautioned: “It is more important that the applicable rule of law be settled than that it be settled right.” “This is commonly true,” Brandeis continued, “even where the error is a matter of serious concern, provided correction can be had by legislation.”³² Revered constitutional scholar Paul A. Freund, who clerked for Justice Brandeis, recalled Justice Cardozo’s readiness to suppress his dissent in common law cases (the Supreme Court had more of those in pre-Erie³³ days), so that an opinion would come down unanimous.³⁴

关于第一种危险，请回忆一下，”伟大的异议者 “奥利弗-温德尔-霍姆斯大法官事实上比他的大多数同事更少提出异议。³⁰首席大法官哈兰-F-斯通曾经写信给卡尔-卢埃林（两位先生都是异议权的公开捍卫者）。”你知道，如果我在每个案件中都写上我不同意意见中表达的一些观点，你和我所有的其他朋友都会停止阅读我的独立意见。”³¹ 在法律解释问题上，路易斯-D-布兰代斯大法官一再告诫。”适用的法律规则被确定下来比它被正确地确定更重要”。”这通常是正确的“，布兰代斯继续说，”即使错误是一个严重的问题，只要可以通过立法来纠正就行。”³² 著名的宪法学者Paul A. Freund曾是布兰代斯大法官的书记员，他回忆说，卡多佐大法官在普通法案件（最高法院在伊利案³³之前的日子里有更多这样的案件）中随时准备压制他的反对意见，以便法院能够产生一致意见。

Separate concurrences and dissents characterize Supreme Court decisions to a much greater extent than they do court of appeals three-judge panel decisions. In the District of Columbia Circuit, for example, for the statistical year ending June 1992, the court rendered 405 judgments in cases not disposed of summarily; over 86 percent of those decisions were unanimous.³⁵ During that same period, the Supreme Court decided 114 cases with full opinions; only 21.9 percent of the decisions were unanimous.³⁶ A reality not highlighted by a press fond of separating Carter from Reagan/Bush appointees³⁷ accounts in considerable measure for this difference: the character of cases heard by courts of appeals combines with our modus operandi to tug us strongly toward the middle, toward moderation and away from notably creative or excessively rigid positions.³⁸ (The tug is not so strong, however, as to make a proposal I recently advanced acceptable. At a meeting of U.S. court of appeals judges in February 1993, I suggested that when panels are unanimous, the standard practice should be to issue the decision per curiam, without disclosing the opinion writer. That would encourage brevity, I thought, and might speed up dispositions. Few of the judges in attendance found the idea appealing.)

在最高法院的判决中，单独的同意意见和反对意见比上诉法院三法官小组的判决要多得多。以哥伦比亚特区巡回法院为例，在截至1992年6月的统计年度中，该法院对未简易处理的案件作出了405项判决；其中86%以上的判决是一致的。 ³⁵ 在同一时期，最高法院对114个案件作出了完整的意见，其中只有21.9%的判决是一致的。 ³⁶ 一个没有被那些喜欢把卡特和里根/布什任命的人分开的媒体所强调的现实³⁷在很大程度上解释了这种差异：上诉法院审理的案件的特点与我们的工作方式相结合，强烈地将我们拉向中间，走向温和，远离明显的创造性或过于僵化的立场。³⁸（不过这种拉力并没有大到让我最近的一个提议获得通过。在1993年2月的一次美国上诉法院法官会议上，我建议，当陪审团一致同意时，标准做法应该是按陪审团的意见发布判决，而不披露意见撰写人。我认为这将鼓励简明扼要，并可能加快处理速度。在场的法官中，很少有人认为这个想法有吸引力）。

Concerning the character of federal cases, unlike the Supreme Court, courts of appeals deal far less frequently with grand constitutional questions than with less cosmic questions of statutory interpretation or the rationality of agency or district court decisions. In most matters of that variety, as Justice Brandeis indicated, it is best that the matter be definitively settled,³⁹ preferably with one opinion. Furthermore, lower court judges are bound more tightly by Supreme Court precedent than is the High Court itself.

关于联邦案件的特点，与最高法院不同，上诉法院处理宏大的宪法问题的频率远远低于处理法律解释或机构或地区法院判决合理性等较小的问题。正如布兰代斯大法官所指出的，在大多数此类问题中，最好是明确地解决这个问题，³⁹最好是有一个意见。此外，下级法院的法官受最高法院判例的约束比最高法院本身更严格。

Turning to the way we operate, I note first that no three-judge panel in a circuit is at liberty to depart from the published decision of a prior panel; law of the circuit may be altered only by the court en banc.⁴⁰ To ensure that each panel knows what the others are doing, the District of Columbia Circuit, and several other federal circuit courts of appeals, circulate opinions to the full court, once approved by a panel, at least a week in advance of release.⁴¹

谈到我们的运作方式，我首先注意到，一个巡回法院的任何三位法官组成的合议庭都不能随意背离前一个合议庭公布的判决；巡回法院的法律只能由法院全院庭审来改变。⁴⁰ 为了确保每个合议庭都知道其他合议庭在做什么，哥伦比亚特区巡回法院和其他几个联邦巡回上诉法院会在合议庭同意后，至少在发布前一周向全法院分发意见。⁴¹

Second, in contrast to district judges, who are the real power holders in the federal court system—lords of their individual fiefdoms from case filing to first instance final judgment—no single court of appeals judge can carry the day in any case. To attract a second vote and establish durable law for the circuit, a judge may find it necessary to moderate her own position, sometimes to be less bold, other times to be less clear.⁴² We can listen to and persuade each other in groups of three more effectively than can a larger panel.

其次，与地区法院法官相反——地区法院法官是联邦法院系统中真正的权力持有者，从案件提交到一审最终判决，他们是辖区的主人——没有一个上诉法院的法官可以在任何案件中主导一切。为了吸引第二票并为巡回法院制定持久的法律，法官可能会发现有必要缓和自己的立场，有时不那么大胆，有时不那么明确。⁴² 比起多人合议庭，三人合议庭能更有效地互相倾听和说服。

On the few occasions each year when we sit en banc—in the District of Columbia Circuit, all twelve of us when we are full strength—I can appreciate why unanimity is so much harder to achieve in Supreme Court judgments. Not only do the Justices deal much more often with constitutional questions, where, in many cases, only overruling or constitutional amendment can correct a mistake. In addition, one becomes weary after going round the table on a first ballot. It is ever so much easier to have a conversation—and an exchange of views on opinion drafts—among three than among nine or twelve.⁴³

每年在我们全体法官开庭的少数情况下——在哥伦比亚特区巡回法院，我们全部12人都是精神饱满，我可以理解为什么在最高法院的判决中，一致意见如此难以实现。大法官们不仅更经常地处理宪法问题，在许多情况下，只有推翻或修改宪法才能纠正一个错误。此外，在第一轮投票后，人们会感到疲惫。三个人之间的对话和对意见草案的意见交流比九个或十二个人之间的对话要容易得多。⁴³

In writing for the court, one must be sensitive to the sensibilities and mind-sets of one’s colleagues, which may mean avoiding certain arguments and authorities, even certain words.⁴⁴ Should institutional concerns affect the tone of separate opinions, when a judge finds it necessary to write one?

在为法院写作时，必须对同事的情感和心态保持敏感，这可能意味着要避免某些论点和权威，甚至是某些词语。⁴⁴那么当法官认为有必要写单独意见时，对机构的关注是否应该影响其语气？

I emphasize first that dissents and separate concurrences are not consummations devoutly to be avoided. As Justice William J. Brennan said in thoughtful defense of dissents: “None of us, lawyer or layman, teacher or student, in our society must ever feel that to express a conviction, honestly and sincerely maintained, is to violate some unwritten law of manners or decorum.”⁴⁵ I question, however, resort to expressions in separate opinions that generate more heat than light. Consider this sample from an April 1991 District of Columbia Circuit decision. The dissenter led off: “Running headlong from the questions briefed and argued before us, my colleagues seek refuge in a theory as novel as it is questionable. Unsupported by precedent, undeveloped by the court, and unresponsive to the facts of this case, the . . . theory announced today has an inauspicious birth.”⁴⁶ That spicy statement, by the way, opposed an en banc opinion in which all of the judges concurred, except the lone dissenter.

我首先强调，反对意见和单独同意意见不是圆满案件所要虔诚避免的。正如威廉-J-布伦南大法官在为反对意见进行深思熟虑的辩护时所说。”在我们的社会中，无论是律师还是普通人，无论是教师还是学生，都不应该觉得表达一个诚实和真诚的信念是违反了一些不成文的礼仪或礼节的法律。”⁴⁵我质疑的是在单独意见中使用容易引发情绪而不是洞见的表达方式。考虑一下1991年4月哥伦比亚特区巡回法院判决中的这个样本。持反对意见的人开始说 “我的同事们从摆在我们面前的问题中一溜烟跑出来，在一个既新颖又有问题的理论中寻求庇护。没有先例的支持，没有法庭的发展，也没有对本案的事实作出反应，今天宣布的……理论有一个不详的诞生。”⁴⁶顺便说一下，这个辛辣的声明反对的是全员庭审的意见——即除了唯一的反对者，所有法官都同意的意见。

It is “not good for public respect for courts and law and the administration of justice,” Roscoe Pound decades ago observed, for an appellate judge to burden an opinion with “intemperate denunciation of [the writer’s] colleagues, violent invective, attributi[on]s of bad motives to the majority of the court, and insinuations of incompetence, negligence, prejudice, or obtuseness of [other judges].”⁴⁷ Yet one has only to thumb through the pages of current volumes of United States Reports and Federal Reporter Second to come upon condemnations by the score of a court or colleague’s opinion or assertion as, for example, “folly,”⁴⁸ “ludicrous,”⁴⁹ “outrageous,”⁵⁰ one that “cannot be taken seriously,”⁵¹ “inexplicable,”⁵² “the quintessence of inequity,”⁵³ a “blow against the People,”⁵⁴ “naked analytical bootstrapping,”⁵⁵ “reminiscent . . . of Sherman’s march through Georgia,”⁵⁶ and “Orwellian.”⁵⁷

几十年前，罗斯科-庞德就指出，如果一个上诉法官在其意见书中加入 “对[作者]的同事进行无礼的谴责、激烈的谩骂、将不良动机归咎于法院的大多数人，并影射[其他法官]的无能、疏忽、偏见或愚钝，这对公众的尊重是不利的。 “⁴⁷然而，人们只需翻翻目前的《美国报告》和《联邦报告》第二卷，就会发现对法院或同事的意见或主张的谴责，例如，”愚蠢”⁴⁸、”可笑”⁴⁹、”无耻”⁵⁰、”不能认真对待”⁵¹、 “无法解释”⁵²、 “不公平的典范”⁵³ 、”对人民的打击”⁵⁴、 “赤裸裸的自圆其说”、⁵⁵ “让人想起…谢尔曼在乔治亚州的行军”⁵⁶ 和 “奥威尔式”⁵⁷。

“[L]anguage impugning the motives of a colleague,” Senior Third Circuit Judge Collins J. Seitz recently commented, may give momentary satisfaction to the separate opinion writer, but “does nothing to further cordial relationships on the court.”⁵⁸ Judge Seitz counseled “waiting a day”—I would suggest even a week or two—“before deciding whether to send a biting response.”⁵⁹

第三巡回法院资深法官 Collins J. Seitz 最近评论说，”指责同事动机的愤怒可能会让独立意见撰写者感到一时的满足，但 “对促进法院的友好关系毫无帮助。”⁵⁸ Seitz 法官建议 “等待一天”——我建议甚至一周或两周——”再决定是否发出尖锐回应”。⁵⁹

The most effective dissent, I am convinced, “stand[s] on its own legal footing”;⁶⁰ it spells out differences without jeopardizing collegiality or public respect for and confidence in the judiciary. I try to write my few separate opinions each year as I once did briefs for appellees—as affirmative statements of my reasons, drafted before receiving the court’s opinion, and later adjusted, as needed, to meet the majority’s presentation. Among pathmarking models, one can look to Justice Curtis’ classic dissent in the Dred Scott case,⁶¹ and, closer to our time, separate opinions by the second Justice John Marshall Harlan.⁶²

我相信，最有效的反对意见是 “站在自己的法律立场上”；⁶⁰它阐明了分歧，但又不损害同事关系或公众对司法机构的尊重和信任。我试图像我曾经为被上诉人写辩护状那样，每年写我的几个独立意见——作为我的理由的肯定性陈述，在收到法院的意见之前起草，然后根据需要调整，以满足多数人的陈述。作为典范性的路标，我们可以参考柯蒂斯大法官在 Dred Scott 案中的经典异议，⁶¹以及更接近我们这个时代的大法官约翰-马歇尔-哈兰二世的单独意见⁶² 。

Taking a comparative sideglance, I find instructive the March 5, 1992, judgment of the Supreme Court of Ireland in the case of Attorney General v. X.⁶³ The case involved a fourteen-year-old girl who, it was alleged, had been raped by the father of a school friend and had become pregnant. She and her parents had gone to England to secure an abortion. But they promptly returned home when notified that the attorney general had obtained an order from the High Court (the court of first instance) in Ireland enjoining their travel and its purpose. At issue was a clause of the Constitution of Ireland that read: “The State acknowledges the right to life of the unborn and, with due regard to the equal right to life of the mother, guarantees in its laws to respect, and, as far as practicable, by its laws to defend and vindicate that right.”⁶⁴

从比较的角度来看，我认为爱尔兰最高法院1992年3月5日对司法部长诉X 一案的判决具有指导意义。⁶³ 该案涉及一个14岁的女孩，据称她被一个同学的父亲强奸并怀孕。她和她的父母去了英国以确保堕胎。但当他们被告知总检察长已从爱尔兰高等法院（初审法院）获得命令，禁止他们的旅行及其目的时，他们立即回国。争论的焦点是爱尔兰宪法中的一项条款，内容如下 “国家承认未出生婴儿的生命权，并在适当考虑母亲的平等生命权的情况下，在其法律中保证尊重，并在可行的情况下，通过其法律捍卫和维护这一权利”⁶⁴ 。

In fact, no implementing laws had been passed, so the courts were called upon to interpret the Constitution directly. The Supreme Court, composed of five judges, voted four to one to set aside the High Court’s February 17, 1992, injunction.⁶⁵ Each judge spoke separately, but the majority agreed that, in view of the documented “real and substantial” risk that the girl would take her own life, termination of her pregnancy was permissible, even in Ireland itself. In so ruling, the Chief Justice referred to precedent calling upon judges to bring to bear on their judgments the instruction in the Constitution’s preamble that the fundamental instrument of government was adopted by the people “to promote the common good, with due observance of prudence, justice and charity so that the dignity and freedom of the individual might be assured.”⁶⁶ Those concepts and judicial interpretations of them, the Chief Justice said, “may gradually change or develop as society changes and develops.”⁶⁷

事实上，当时还没有通过任何相关的施行法律，所以法院被要求直接解释宪法。由五名法官组成的最高法院以四比一的投票结果撤销了高等法院1992年2月17日的禁令。⁶⁵ 每位法官都分别发言，但大多数人都同意，鉴于有文件证明该女孩有 “真实和实质性 “的自杀风险，即使在爱尔兰，也应允许终止其妊娠。在这个判决中，首席大法官提到了一些先例，这些先例要求法官将宪法序言中的指示带到他们的判决中，即人民建立政府的根本原因是为了”促进共同利益，并适当遵守审慎、正义和仁慈，从而确保个人的尊严和自由。”⁶⁶ 首席大法官说，这些概念和对它们的司法解释，”可能随着社会的变化和发展逐渐改变或发展。⁶⁷

The dissenting Justice spent no energy characterizing his colleagues’ opinions as “activist” or “imperial.”⁶⁸ He simply stated affirmatively his view that the evidence did not justify overturning the injunction.⁶⁹ “Suicide threats,” he reasoned, “can be contained.”⁷⁰ “The choice,” he said, was “between the certain death of the unborn life and a feared substantial danger . . . but no degree of certainty of the mother’s death by way of self-destruction.”⁷¹ The Constitution’s “equal right” provision, he concluded, required the judiciary to prevent the certain death, not the one that could be guarded against.

反对的大法官没有花精力把他的同事的意见说成是 “司法能动主义 “或 “帝国主义”。⁶⁸ 他只是肯定地指出他的观点，即证据并不足以支持推翻禁令。⁶⁹ “自杀威胁，”他推断，”可以被控制。 “⁷⁰ “他说，”我们是在未出生胎儿的必然死亡和担心母亲会自杀的实质性危险的恐惧之间做选择……但母亲自杀的可能性是不确定的。”⁷¹ 他总结说，宪法的 “平等权利 “条款要求司法部门阻止肯定的死亡，而不是可以防范的死亡。

I did not select this example as a springboard to comparison of positions on access to abortion under constitutional prescriptions and legal regimes here and abroad.⁷² I chose Attorney General v. X only to demonstrate that even in the most emotion-laden, politically sensitive case, effective opinion writing does not require a judge to upbraid colleagues for failing to see the light or to get it right.⁷³

我选择这个例子并不是为了比较美国和外国宪法和法律制度对堕胎的立场。⁷²我选择司法部长诉X案只是为了证明，即使在最充满感情、政治敏感的案件中，有效的意见写作并不要求法官指责同事没有领悟或没有得到正确的答案⁷³ 。

Concerned about the erosion of civility in the legal profession, the Seventh Circuit, commencing in the fall of 1989, conducted a “study and investigation into litigation practices and the attending relationships among lawyers, among judges, and between lawyers and judges.”⁷⁴ The Final Report of the committee in charge of the study, released in June 1992, urges judges to set a good example by staying on the high ground. Specifically, the report calls on judges to avoid “disparaging personal remarks or criticisms, or sarcastic or demeaning comments about another judge,” and instead to “be courteous, respectful, and civil in opinions, ever mindful that a position articulated by another judge generally is the result of that judge’s earnest effort to interpret the law and the facts correctly.”⁷⁵ To that good advice, one can say “amen.”

由于担心法律界的文明程度受到侵蚀，第七巡回法院从1989年秋季开始，对 “诉讼惯例以及律师之间、法官之间、律师与法官之间的关系进行了研究和调查。”⁷⁴负责这项研究的委员会于1992年6月发表的最后报告敦促法官树立良好的榜样，站在高处。具体而言，该报告呼吁法官避免 “贬低个人言论或批评，或讽刺或贬低另一位法官”，而是 “在发表意见时要礼貌、尊重和文明，永远记住另一位法官所阐述的立场通常是该法官认真努力正确解释法律和事实的结果。”⁷⁵ 对于这个好建议，人们可以说 “阿门”。

II Measured Motions in Third Branch Decisionmaking 第三权判决中的审慎提议

Moving from the style to the substance of Third Branch decisionmaking, I will stress in the remainder of these remarks that judges play an interdependent part in our democracy. They do not alone shape legal doctrine but, as I suggested at the outset, they participate in a dialogue with other organs of government, and with the people as well.⁷⁶ “Judges do and must legislate,” Justice Holmes “recognized without hesitation,” but “they can do so,” he cautioned, “only interstitially; they are confined from molar to molecular motions.”⁷⁷ Measured motions seem to me right, in the main, for constitutional as well as common law adjudication. Doctrinal limbs too swiftly shaped, experience teaches, may prove unstable.⁷⁸ The most prominent example in recent decades is Roe v. Wade.⁷⁹ To illustrate my point, I have contrasted that breathtaking 1973 decision with the Court’s more cautious dispositions, contemporaneous with Roe, in cases involving explicitly sex-based classifications,⁸⁰ and will further develop that comparison here.

谈论完了第三权的风格，我接下来将讨论第三权的实质，在这篇评论的剩余部分，我将强调法官在我们的民主中发挥着相互依赖的作用。他们并不单独塑造法律学说，但正如我在一开始所建议的那样，他们参与了与政府其他机构以及与人民的对话。⁷⁶“法官确实而且必须立法，”霍姆斯法官 “毫不犹豫地承认”，但他告诫说：”他们只能填隙式地做；他们被限制在小的动议中。”⁷⁷在我看来，对宪法和普通法的判决应该审慎，这大致是对的。经验告诉我们，教义的四肢如果成形的太快，可能会被证明是不稳定的。⁷⁸ 近几十年来最突出的例子是罗诉韦德案。⁷⁹ 为了说明我的观点，我曾将1973年罗案那令人震惊的判决与同时期法院在涉及明确的基于性别分类的案件中更谨慎的判决进行了对比，⁸⁰我将在这里进一步探讨这一对比。

The seven-to-two judgment in Roe v. Wade⁸¹ declared “violative of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment” a Texas criminal abortion statute that intolerably shackled a woman’s autonomy; the Texas law “excepted from criminality only a life-saving procedure on behalf of the pregnant woman.”⁸² Suppose the Court had stopped there, rightly declaring unconstitutional the most extreme brand of law in the nation, and had not gone on, as the Court did in Roe, to fashion a regime blanketing the subject, a set of rules that displaced virtually every state law then in force.⁸³ Would there have been the twenty-year controversy we have witnessed, reflected most recently in the Supreme Court’s splintered decision in Planned Parenthood v. Casey?⁸⁴ A less encompassing Roe, one that merely struck down the extreme Texas law and went no further on that day, I believe and will summarize why, might have served to reduce rather than to fuel controversy.

在罗诉韦德案⁸¹中，最高法院以七比二的判决宣布德克萨斯州的刑事堕胎法规”违反了第十四修正案的正当程序条款”，不可容忍地束缚了妇女的自主权；德克萨斯州的法律 “仅将代表孕妇的生命拯救程序排除在犯罪之外。 “⁸² 假设法院到此为止，正确地宣布全国最极端的法律违宪，而不是像法院在罗案中那样，制定一个涵盖该主题的制度，一套取代当时生效的几乎所有州法律的规则。 ⁸³ 我们是否会有二十年的争议，就像最近在最高法院对宾州东南部计划生育组织诉凯西案的分裂判决中体现的那样？ ⁸⁴ 我认为，并将论证，如果罗案的范围较小，只是推翻了得克萨斯州的极端法律，而没有进一步拓展，可能会起到减少而不是加剧争议的作用。

In the 1992 Planned Parenthood decision, the three controlling Justices accepted as constitutional several restrictions on access to abortion that could not have survived strict adherence to Roe.⁸⁵ While those Justices did not closely consider the plight of women without means to overcome the restrictions, they added an important strand to the Court’s opinions on abortion—they acknowledged the intimate connection between a woman’s “ability to control her reproductive life” and her “ability . . . to participate equally in the economic and social life of the Nation.”⁸⁶ The idea of the woman in control of her destiny and her place in society⁸⁷ was less prominent in the Roe decision itself, which coupled with the rights of the pregnant woman the free exercise of her physician’s medical judgment.⁸⁸ The Roe decision might have been less of a storm center⁸⁹ had it both homed in more precisely on the women’s equality dimension of the issue and, correspondingly, attempted nothing more bold at that time than the mode of decisionmaking the Court employed in the 1970s gender classification cases.

在1992年的宾州东南部计划生育组织诉凯西案判决中，三位持最多数意见的大法官接受了对获得堕胎的若干限制，这些限制在严格遵守罗案的情况下是不可能存在的。⁸⁵ 虽然这些大法官没有仔细考虑没有办法克服这些限制的妇女的困境，但他们为法院关于堕胎的意见增加了一个重要部分——他们承认妇女 “控制其生殖生活的能力 “与她 “平等参与国家经济和社会生活的能力 “之间存在密切联系。 “⁸⁶ 妇女掌握自己的命运和在社会中的地位的想法⁸⁷ 在罗案判决本身中并不突出，它与孕妇自由行使医生的医疗判断的权利结合在一起。⁸⁸ 如果罗案的判决能更准确地定位在妇女平等方面，并且没有采用比法院在1970年代其他性别分类案件中更激进的决策模式，它可能就不会成为一个风暴中心⁸⁹ 。

In fact, the very Term Roe was decided, the Supreme Court had on its calendar a case that could have served as a bridge, linking reproductive choice to disadvantageous treatment of women on the basis of their sex. The case was Struck v. Secretary of Defense;⁹⁰ it involved a captain the Air Force sought to discharge in Vietnam War days. Perhaps it is indulgence in wishful thinking, but the Struck case, I believe, would have proved extraordinarily educational for the Court and had large potential for advancing public understanding. Captain Susan Struck was a career officer. According to her commanding officer, her performance as a manager and nurse was exemplary.⁹¹ Captain Struck had avoided the drugs and the alcohol that hooked many service members in the late 1960s and early 1970s,⁹² but she did become pregnant while stationed in Vietnam. She undertook to use, and in fact used, only her accumulated leave time for childbirth. She declared her intention to place, and in fact placed, her child for adoption immediately after birth. Her religious faith precluded recourse to abortion.⁹³

事实上，就在罗案判决的同一工作庭期，最高法院的日程表上有一个案件可以作为桥梁，将生殖选择与基于性别的不利于妇女的待遇联系起来。该案是斯特拉克诉国防部长案；⁹⁰该案涉及空军在在越战时期寻求逼迫一名上尉退伍。也许这只是我一厢情愿，但我相信斯特拉克案会被证明对法院具有极大的教育意义，并有可能促进公众理解。苏珊-斯特拉克上尉是一名职业军官。据她的指挥官说，她作为管理人员和护士的表现堪称典范。⁹¹ 斯特拉克上尉在1960年代末和1970年代初避免了让许多军人迷恋的毒品和酒精，⁹² 但她在驻扎在越南时确实怀孕了。她承诺使用，事实上也只使用了她累积的休假时间来生孩子。她宣布打算在孩子出生后立即将其送去收养，也确实这么做了。她的宗教信仰不允许她堕胎。⁹³

Two features of Captain Struck’s case are particularly noteworthy. First, the rule she challenged was unequivocal and typical of the time. It provided: “A woman officer will be discharged from the service with the least practicable delay when a determination is made by a medical officer that she is pregnant.”⁹⁴ To cover any oversight, the Air Force had a backup rule: “The commission of any woman officer will be terminated with the least practicable delay when it is established that she . . . has given birth to a living child while in a commissioned officer status.”⁹⁵

斯特拉克上尉的案件有两个特点特别值得注意。首先，她所质疑的规则是明确的，是当时的典型。它规定 “当医务人员确定一名女军官怀孕时，她将在最短的时间内被开除。”⁹⁴为了保证没有任何遗漏，空军还有一条备用规则：“如果确定任何女军官……在担任军官期间生了一个孩子，将在最短的时间内终止她的职务。”⁹⁵

A second striking element of Captain Struck’s case was the escape route available to her, which she chose not to take. Air Force regulations current at the start of the 1970s provided: “The Air Force Medical Service is not subject to State laws in the performance of its functions. When medically indicated or for reasons involving medical health, pregnancies may be terminated in Air Force hospitals . . . ideally before 20 weeks gestation.”⁹⁶

斯特拉克上尉案件的第二个引人注目的因素是有其他的解决方案（堕胎），但她拒绝了。20世纪70年代初的空军条例规定。”空军医务处在履行其职能时不受国家法律的约束。当有医学指征或涉及医疗健康的原因时，可以在空军医院终止妊娠……最好是在妊娠20周之前”⁹⁶。

Captain Struck argued that the unwanted discharge she faced unjustifiably restricted her personal autonomy and dignity; principally, however, she maintained that the regulation mandating her discharge violated the equal protection of the laws guarantee implicit in the Fifth Amendment’s Due Process Clause.⁹⁷ She urged that the Air Force regime differentiated invidiously by allowing males who became fathers, but not females who became mothers, to remain in service and by allowing women who had undergone abortions, but not women who delivered infants, to continue their military careers.⁹⁸ Her pleas were unsuccessful in the lower courts, but on October 24, 1972, less than three months before the Roe decision, the Supreme Court granted her petition for certiorari.⁹⁹

斯特拉克上尉辩称，她所面临的她不喜欢的解雇不合理地限制了她的个人自主权和尊严；然而，她主要坚持认为，规定她被解雇的条例违反了第五修正案的正当程序条款中隐含的法律平等保护保障。⁹⁷ 她敦促说，空军的制度允许成为父亲的男性继续服役，但不允许成为母亲的女性继续服役，允许接受堕胎的妇女继续其军事生涯，但不允许分娩的妇女继续其军事生涯，这是一种令人反感的区别对待。⁹⁸ 她的请求在下级法院没有成功，但在1972年10月24日，在罗案判决前不到三个月，最高法院决定审理她的诉讼请求。⁹⁹

At that point the Air Force decided it would rather switch than fight. At the end of November 1972, it granted Captain Struck a waiver of the once unwaivable regulation and permitted her to continue her service as an Air Force officer. The solicitor general promptly and successfully suggested that the case had become moot.¹⁰⁰

这时，空军决定打官司不如换政策。1972年11月底，空军批准斯特拉克上尉豁免曾经不可豁免的规定，允许她继续作为空军军官服役。首席检察官迅速并成功地提出，该案已变得毫无意义。¹⁰⁰

Given the parade of cases on the Court’s full calendar, it is doubtful that the Justices trained further attention on the Struck scenario. With more time and space for reflection, however, and perhaps a female presence on the Court, might the Justices have gained at least these two insights? First, if even the military, an institution not known for avant-garde policy, had taken to providing facilities for abortion, then was not a decision of Roe’s muscularity unnecessary? Second, confronted with Captain Struck’s unwanted discharge, might the Court have comprehended an argument, or at least glimpsed a reality, it later resisted—that disadvantageous treatment of a woman because of her pregnancy and reproductive choice is a paradigm case of discrimination on the basis of sex?¹⁰¹ What was the assumption underlying the differential treatment to which Captain Struck was exposed? The regulations that mandated her discharge were not even thinly disguised. They declared, effectively, that responsibility for children disabled female parents, but not male parents, for other work—not for biological reasons, but because society had ordered things that way.¹⁰²

鉴于法院日程表上的案件繁多，大法官们是否对斯特拉克案进行了进一步的关注值得怀疑。然而，如果有更多的时间和空间进行思考，以及或许还会有女性出庭，大法官们可能至少会获得以下两点启示？首先，如果连军队这个并不以前卫政策著称的机构都开始为堕胎提供设施，那么罗案的决定岂不是没有必要？第二，面对斯特拉克上尉的意外退役，法院可能已经理解了一个论点，或者至少瞥见了一个现实，它后来抵制了这个论点——因为妇女怀孕和生育选择而受到的不利待遇是基于性别的歧视的典范案例？ ¹⁰¹ 斯特拉克上尉所面临的差别待遇的基础假设是什么？规定她被开除的条例甚至没有任何掩饰的意思。他们有效地宣布，对孩子的责任使母亲不能从事其他工作，而父亲则不会——不是因为生理原因，而是因为社会已经这样安排。¹⁰²

Captain Struck had asked the Court first to apply the highest level of scrutiny to her case, to hold that the sex-based classification she encountered was a “suspect” category for legislative or administrative action.¹⁰³ As a fallback, she suggested to the Court an intermediate standard of review, one under which prescriptions that worked to women’s disadvantage would gain review of at least heightened, if not the very highest, intensity.¹⁰⁴ In the course of the 1970s, the Supreme Court explicitly acknowledged that it was indeed applying an elevated, labeled “intermediate,” level of review to classifications it recognized as sex-based.¹⁰⁵

斯特拉克上尉首先要求法院对她的案件适用最高级别的审查，认为她遇到的基于性别的分类是立法或行政行动的 “可疑 “类别。 ¹⁰³ 作为退路，她向法院提出了一个中间审查标准，根据这个标准，对妇女不利的规定即使不适用最高强度的审查，也至少是高强度的审查。¹⁰⁴ 在1970年代，最高法院明确承认，它确实对它认为是基于性别的分类适用一个高强度的、被称为 “中间 “的审查水平。¹⁰⁵

Justice O’Connor carefully traced that development in last year’s Madison Lecture,¹⁰⁶ and I will recall it only summarily. Until 1971, women did not prevail before the Supreme Court in any case charging unconstitutional sex discrimination.¹⁰⁷ In the years from 1971 to 1982, however, the Court held unconstitutional, as violative of due process or equal protection constraints, a series of state and federal laws that differentiated explicitly on the basis of sex.¹⁰⁸

奥康纳大法官在去年的麦迪逊讲座中仔细追溯了这一发展，¹⁰⁶我只想简要回顾一下。直到1971年，在指控违宪的性别歧视的任何案件中，妇女都没有在最高法院胜诉。¹⁰⁷然而，在1971年至1982年期间，法院认为一系列明确基于性别的州和联邦法律违反了正当程序或平等保护的约束，因此是违宪的。¹⁰⁸

The Court ruled in 1973, for example, that married women in the military were entitled to the housing allowance and family medical care benefits that Congress had provided solely for married men in the military.¹⁰⁹ Two years later, the Court held it unconstitutional for a state to allow a parent to stop supporting a daughter once she reached the age of 18, while requiring parental support for a son until he turned 21.¹¹⁰ In 1975, and again in 1979, the Court declared that state jury-selection systems could not exclude or exempt women as a class.¹¹¹ In decisions running from 1975 to 1980, the Court deleted the principal explicitly sex-based classifications in social insurance¹¹² and workers’ compensation schemes.¹¹³ In 1981, the Court said nevermore to a state law designating the husband “head and master” of the household.¹¹⁴ And in 1982, in an opinion by Justice O’Connor, the Court held that a state could not limit admission to a state nursing college to women only.¹¹⁵

例如，法院在1973年裁定，军队中的已婚妇女有权享受国会只为军队中的已婚男子规定的住房津贴和家庭医疗福利。¹⁰⁹两年后，法院认为，如果一个州允许父母在女儿年满18岁时停止抚养她，那要求父母抚养儿子直到他21岁就是违宪的。 ¹¹⁰ 1975年，以及1979年，法院宣布各州的陪审团选拔制度不能将妇女作为一个类别排除或豁免。¹¹¹ 在1975年至1980年的判决中，法院删除了社会保险¹¹²和工人赔偿计划¹¹³中主要的明确的基于性别的分类。1981年，最高法院不再允许州法认定丈夫为家庭 “户主和主人 “。¹¹⁴1982年，在奥康纳大法官主笔的判决书中，法院认为一个州不能将一所州立护理学院的入学名额只限于女性。¹¹⁵

The backdrop for these rulings was a phenomenal expansion, in the years from 1961 to 1971, of women’s employment outside the home,¹¹⁶ the civil rights movement of the 1960s and the precedents set in that struggle,¹¹⁷ and a revived feminist movement, fueled abroad and in the United States by Simone de Beauvoir’s remarkable 1949 publication, The Second Sex.¹¹⁸ In the main, the Court invalidated laws that had become obsolete, retained into the 1970s by only a few of the states.¹¹⁹ In a core set of cases, however, those dealing with social insurance benefits for a worker’s spouse or family,¹²⁰ the decisions did not utterly condemn the legislature’s product. Instead, the Court, in effect, opened a dialogue with the political branches of government. In essence, the Court instructed Congress and state legislatures: rethink ancient positions on these questions. Should you determine that special treatment for women is warranted, i.e., compensatory legislation because of the sunken-in social and economic bias or disadvantage women encounter, we have left you a corridor in which to move.¹²¹ But your classifications must be refined, adopted for remedial reasons, and not rooted in prejudice about “the way women (or men) are.”¹²² In the meantime, the Court’s decrees removed no benefits; instead, they extended to a woman worker’s husband, widower, or family benefits Congress had authorized only for members of a male worker’s family.¹²³

这些判决的背景是，在1961年至1971年期间，妇女在家庭以外就业的人数显著增加，¹¹⁶ 1960年代的民权运动以及在这场斗争中确立的先例，¹¹⁷ 以及由西蒙娜-德-波伏瓦1949年出版的《第二性》¹¹⁸在国外和美国复兴的女权运动。主要而言，法院宣布那些已经过时、只有少数几个州还保留到1970年代的法律无效。¹¹⁹ 然而，在一系列案件的核心，那些涉及工人配偶或家庭的社会保险福利的案件，¹²⁰ 判决并没有完全谴责立法机构的立法。相反，法院实际上是与政府的政治部门展开了对话。从本质上讲，法院指示国会和州立法机构：重新思考对这些问题的古老立场。如果你们确定有必要对妇女进行特殊处理，即针对妇女在社会和经济方面遇到的偏见或劣势的补偿性立法，那我们为你们留下了可行的通道。¹²¹ 但你们的分类必须细致，应该是出于补救的原因而采用，而不是植根于对 “女性（或男性）就是这样 “的偏见。¹²² 同时，法院的法令没有取消任何福利；相反，它们将国会只授权给男性工人家庭成员的福利扩展到女性工人的丈夫、鳏夫或家庭。¹²³

The ball, one might say, was tossed by the Justices back into the legislators’ court, where the political forces of the day could operate. The Supreme Court wrote modestly, it put forward no grand philosophy;¹²⁴ but by requiring legislative reexamination of once-customary sex-based classifications, the Court helped to ensure that laws and regulations would “catch up with a changed world.”¹²⁵

可以说，大法官们把球扔回了立法者的场地，在那里，当时的政治力量可以运作。最高法院写得很谦虚，没有提出任何宏大的理念；¹²⁴ 但通过要求立法机构重新审查曾经习惯的基于性别的分类，法院帮助确保法律和法规能够 “跟上变化的世界”¹²⁵ 。

Roe v. Wade,¹²⁶ in contrast, invited no dialogue with legislators. Instead, it seemed entirely to remove the ball from the legislators’ court. In 1973, when Roe issued, abortion law was in a state of change across the nation. As the Supreme Court itself noted, there was a marked trend in state legislatures “toward liberalization of abortion statutes.”¹²⁷ That movement for legislative change ran parallel to another law revision effort then under way—the change from fault to no-fault divorce regimes, a reform that swept through the state legislatures and captured all of them by the mid-1980s.¹²⁸

相比之下，”罗诉韦德 “案¹²⁶ 没有邀请立法者进行对话。相反，它似乎完全是为了把球从立法者的场地上拿走。1973年，当罗案判决时，全国的堕胎法正处于转变状态。正如最高法院本身所指出的，各州立法机构有一个明显的趋势，即 “堕胎法规的自由化”。¹²⁷ 这一立法变革运动与当时正在进行的另一项法律修订工作一起推进——从过错离婚制度到无过错离婚制度的转变，这一离婚制度改革席卷了各州立法机构，并在20世纪80年代中期将其全部占领。¹²⁸

No measured motion, the Roe decision left virtually no state with laws fully conforming to the Court’s delineation of abortion regulation still permissible.¹²⁹ Around that extraordinary decision, a well-organized and vocal right-to-life movement rallied and succeeded, for a considerable time, in turning the legislative tide in the opposite direction.

罗案的判决不够审慎，它使得几乎所有州的法律都不符合最高法院允许的对堕胎的划定。¹²⁹ 围绕着这一特殊的决定，一场组织严密、声势浩大的生命权运动集结起来，并在相当长的一段时间内成功地将立法潮流转向相反的方向。

Constitutional review by courts is an institution that has been for some two centuries our nation’s hallmark and pride.¹³⁰ Two extreme modes of court intervention in social change processes, however, have placed stress on the institution. At one extreme, the Supreme Court steps boldly in front of the political process, as some believe it did in Roe.¹³¹ At the opposite extreme, the Court in the early part of the twentieth century found—or thrust—itself into the rear guard opposing change, striking down, as unconstitutional, laws embodying a new philosophy of economic regulation at odds with the nineteenth century’s laissez-faire approach.¹³² Decisions at both of these poles yielded outcries against the judiciary in certain quarters. The Supreme Court, particularly, was labeled “activist” or “imperial,” and its precarious position as final arbiter of constitutional questions was exposed.¹³³

法院的宪法审查是一种制度，大约两个世纪以来一直是我们国家的标志和骄傲。¹³⁰ 然而，法院干预社会变革进程的两种极端模式给该制度带来了压力。在一个极端，最高法院大胆地走到了政治进程的前面，正如一些人认为它在罗案中所做的那样。¹³¹在另一个极端，法院在20世纪早期发现——或者说把自己变成了——反对变革的后卫，把体现了与19世纪自由放任的经济监管新理念的法律视为违宪而予以驳回。¹³² 这两个极端的判决都在某些方面引起了对司法机构的强烈不满。尤其是最高法院，被贴上了 “能动主义者 “或 “帝国主义 “的标签，其作为宪法问题最终仲裁者的不稳定地位被暴露出来。¹³³

I do not suggest that the Court should never step ahead of the political branches in pursuit of a constitutional precept. Brown v. Board of Education,¹³⁴ the 1954 decision declaring racial segregation in public schools offensive to the equal protection principle, is the case that best fits the bill. Past the midpoint of the twentieth century, apartheid remained the law-enforced system in several states, shielded by a constitutional interpretation the Court itself advanced at the turn of the century—the “separate but equal” doctrine.¹³⁵

我并不是说，法院在追求宪法戒律的过程中永远不应该走在政治部门的前面。布朗诉教育委员会案¹³⁴，即1954年宣布公立学校的种族隔离违反了平等保护原则的判决，是最符合该法案的案例。过了二十世纪中期，种族隔离仍然是几个州的法律执行制度，受到法院自己在世纪之交提出的宪法解释——”隔离但平等 “原则的保护。¹³⁵

In contrast to the legislative reform movement in the states, contemporaneous with Roe, widening access to abortion, prospects in 1954 for state legislation dismantling racially segregated schools were bleak. That was so, I believe, for a reason that distances race discrimination from discrimination based on sex. Most women are life partners of men; women bear and raise both sons and daughters. Once women’s own consciousness was awakened to the unfairness of allocating opportunity and responsibility on the basis of sex, education of others—of fathers, husbands, sons as well as daughters—could begin, or be reinforced, at home.¹³⁶ When blacks were confined by law to a separate sector, there was no similar prospect for educating the white majority.¹³⁷

与各州的立法改革运动形成鲜明对比的是与罗案同时期的扩大堕胎机会的运动，1954年各州立法拆除种族隔离的学校的前景是暗淡的。我认为，之所以如此，是因为种族歧视与基于性别的歧视有一定的区别。大多数女性是男性的生活伴侣；女性既生育又抚养儿子和女儿。一旦妇女自己的意识被唤醒，意识到基于性别分配机会和责任的不公平性，对其他人——父亲、丈夫、儿子和女儿——的教育就可以从家庭开始，或者得到加强。¹³⁶当黑人被法律限制在一个单独的部门时，并不存在类似的自动教育多数白人的机会。¹³⁷

It bears emphasis, however, that Brown was not an altogether bold decision. First, Thurgood Marshall and those who worked with him in the campaign against racial injustice, carefully set the stepping-stones leading up to the landmark ruling.¹³⁸ Pathmarkers of the same kind had not been installed prior to the Court’s decision in Roe.¹³⁹ Second, Brown launched no broadside attack on the Jim Crow system in all its institutional manifestations. Instead, the Court concentrated on segregated schools;¹⁴⁰ it left the follow-up for other days and future cases. A burgeoning civil rights movement—which Brown helped to propel—culminating in the Civil Rights Act of 1964,¹⁴¹ set the stage for the Court’s ultimate total rejection of Jim Crow legislation.

然而，值得强调的是，布朗案并不是一个完全大胆的决定。首先，瑟古德-马歇尔和那些在反对种族不公正的运动中与他合作的人，精心设置了通往这一里程碑式判决的垫脚石。.¹³⁸在法院对罗案作出判决之前则还没有类似的路标。¹³⁹ 其次，布朗案没有对吉姆克劳制度的所有制度性表现进行广泛攻击。相反，法院专注于种族隔离的学校；¹⁴⁰ 它把后续工作留给了其他日子和未来的案件。蓬勃发展的民权运动——布朗案帮助推动了这一运动——最终形成了1964年的《民权法案》，¹⁴¹ 为法院最终完全拒绝吉姆-克劳法奠定了基础。

Significantly, in relation to the point I just made about women and men living together, the end of the Jim Crow era came in 1967, thirteen years after Brown: the case was Loving v. Virginia,¹⁴² the law under attack, a state prohibition on interracial marriage. In holding that law unconstitutional, the Court effectively ruled that, with regard to racial classifications, the doctrine of “separate but equal” was dead—everywhere and anywhere within the governance of the United States.¹⁴³

重要的是，就我刚才提出的关于男女同居的观点而言，吉姆-克劳时代的结束是在1967年，即布朗案的13年之后：案件是Loving诉弗吉尼亚，¹⁴²受到攻击的法律是州政府禁止异族通婚的规定。在认定该法律违宪的同时，法院有效地裁定，在种族分类方面，”隔离但平等”的理论已经死亡——在美国的任何地方和管理范围内。¹⁴³

The framers of the Constitution allowed to rest in the Court’s hands large authority to rule on the Constitution’s meaning; but the framers, as I noted at the outset, armed the Court with no swords to carry out its pronouncements. President Andrew Jackson in 1832, according to an often-told legend, said of a Supreme Court decision he did not like: “The Chief Justice has made his decision, now let him enforce it.”¹⁴⁴ With prestige to persuade, but not physical power to enforce, with a will for self-preservation and the knowledge that they are not “a bevy of Platonic Guardians,”¹⁴⁵ the Justices generally follow, they do not lead, changes taking place elsewhere in society.¹⁴⁶ But without taking giant strides and thereby risking a backlash too forceful to contain, the Court, through constitutional adjudication, can reinforce or signal a green light for a social change. In most of the post-1970 gender-classification cases, unlike Roe, the Court functioned in just that way. It approved the direction of change through a temperate brand of decisionmaking, one that was not extravagant or divisive. Roe, on the other hand, halted a political process that was moving in a reform direction and thereby, I believe, prolonged divisiveness and deferred stable settlement of the issue. The most recent Planned Parenthood decision¹⁴⁷ notably retreats from Roe¹⁴⁸ and further excludes from the High Court’s protection women lacking the means or the sophistication to surmount burdensome legislation.¹⁴⁹ The latest decision may have had the sanguine effect, however, of contributing to the ongoing revitalization in the 1980s and 1990s of the political movement in progress in the early 1970s, a movement that addressed not simply or dominantly the courts but primarily the people’s representatives and the people themselves. That renewed force, one may hope, will—within a relatively short span—yield an enduring resolution of this vital matter in a way that affirms the dignity and equality of women.¹⁵⁰

宪法制定者允许最高法院拥有对宪法含义进行判决的巨大权力；但正如我在一开始指出的那样，宪法制定者没有给法院配备执行其声明的剑。根据一个经常被提及的传说，1832年安德鲁-杰克逊总统在谈到他不喜欢的一项最高法院判决时说 “首席大法官已经做出了他的决定，现在让他来执行吧。”¹⁴⁴大法官有说服力，但没有执行力，他们有自我保护的意愿，也知道自己不是 “一群柏拉图式的监护人”，¹⁴⁵大法官通常会跟随而不是领导社会上其他地方发生的变化。 ¹⁴⁶即使不冒着难以遏制的反弹的风险采取大踏步的行动，法院仍可以通过宪法判决来加强或发出社会变革的绿灯。在1970年后的大多数性别分类案件中，与罗案不同，法院正是以这种方式发挥作用。它通过一种温和的判决批准了变革的方向，这种决策不是不切实际的或分裂的。另一方面，罗案停止了一个正朝着改革方向发展的政治进程，因此，我认为，它延长了分歧，推迟了问题的稳定解决。最近的宾州东南部计划生育组织诉凯西案的判决¹⁴⁷明显地从罗案¹⁴⁸中退了出来，并进一步将缺乏克服繁琐立法的手段或能力的妇女排除在高等法院的保护之外。¹⁴⁹然而，最新的判决可能产生了令人振奋的效果，即促进了20世纪80年代和90年代正在进行的政治运动的振兴，这一运动不是简单或主要针对法院，而是主要针对人民的代表和人民本身。人们希望，这种新的力量将在相对较短的时间内，以肯定妇女尊严和平等的方式，对这一重要问题作出持久的解决。¹⁵⁰

Conclusion 结论

To sum up what I have tried to convey in this lecture, I will recall the counsel my teacher and friend, Professor Gerald Gunther, offered when I was installed as a judge. Professor Gunther had in mind a great jurist, Judge Learned Hand, whose biography Professor Gunther is just now completing. The good judge, Professor Gunther said, is “openminded and detached . . . heedful of limitations stemming from the judge’s own competence and, above all, from the presuppositions of our constitutional scheme; th[at] judge . . . recognizes that a felt need to act only interstitially does not mean relegation of judges to a trivial or mechanical role, but rather affords the most responsible room for creative, important judicial contributions.”¹⁵¹

为了总结我在这次演讲中试图表达的内容，我将回顾我的老师和朋友杰拉尔德-冈瑟教授在我被任命为法官时提出的建议。冈瑟教授想到了一位伟大的法学家——勒恩德·汉德法官，冈瑟教授刚刚完成了他的传记。冈瑟教授说，好的法官是 “心胸开阔，超然物外……注意来自法官自身能力的限制，尤其是来自我们宪法制度的预设；该法官……认识到，感觉到只需在间隙中行事并不意味着将法官降格为琐碎或机械的角色，而是为创造性的重要司法贡献提供了最负责任的空间”¹⁵¹ 。