Greabe — Volume 62, Issue 4

When courts find constitutional violations, they face difficult questions about whether and how to award relief. Greabe examines the Supreme Court's doctrine for withholding constitutional remedies, arguing that existing justifications fail scrutiny and that the doctrine creates incoherence across constitutional contexts. The article traces non-retroactivity principles from cases like Teague v. Lane and analyzes remedial doctrines (Eleventh Amendment immunity, sovereign immunity, habeas-error doctrines) that allow courts to withhold relief for proven constitutional wrongs. Greabe demonstrates that the Supreme Court has limited development of mandatory relief doctrine to substitutionary remedies—damages, suppression, and voidness—while denying specific remedies ameliorating ongoing constitutional harms like those alleged in Brown v. Plata. The article challenges the premise that relief is discretionary once plaintiffs prove constitutional violations, using Brown v. Plata (prison overcrowding) as a case study demonstrating the Court's selective approach to specific remedies. Greabe proposes that federal judges adopt the solution from United States v. Vanderwerff, rejecting plea agreements containing appeal waivers, or embrace deferential appellate review. His analysis reveals tension between the Court's treatment of substitutionary versus specific constitutional remedies.

Topics: Constitutional Law · Criminal Procedure · Evidence & Procedure

Keywords: constitutional remedies · Brown v. Plata · Teague v. Lane · judicial discretion · habeas corpus · non-retroactivity doctrine