Opinion of the Court
Instead, only further questions follow. Under the petitioners’ theory, would clerks have to assemble a blacklist of banned claims subject to immediate dismissal? What kind of inquiry would a state court have to apply to satisfy due process before dismissing those suits? How notorious would the alleged constitutional defects of a claim have to be before a state-court clerk would risk legal jeopardy merely for filing it? Would States have to hire independent legal counsel for their clerks—and would those advisers be the next target of suits seeking injunctive relief? When a party hales a state-court clerk into federal court for filing a complaint containing a purportedly unconstitutional claim, how would the clerk defend himself consistent with his ethical obligation of neutrality? See Tex. Code of Judicial Conduct Canon 3(B)(10) (2021) (instructing judges and court staff to abstain from taking public positions on pending or impending proceedings). Could federal courts enjoin those who perform other ministerial tasks potentially related to litigation, like the postal carrier who delivers complaints to the courthouse? Many more questions than answers would present themselves if the Court journeyed this way.
Our colleagues writing separately today supply no answers either. They agree that state-court judges are not proper defendants in this lawsuit because they are “in no sense adverse” to the parties whose cases they decide. Post, at 4 (opinion of Roberts, C. J.). At the same time, our colleagues say they would allow this case to proceed against clerks like Ms. Clarkston. See ibid.; see also post, at 7 (opinion of Sotomayor, J.). But in doing so they fail to address the many remedial questions their path invites. They neglect to explain how clerks who merely docket S. B. 8 lawsuits can be considered “adverse litigants” for Article III purposes while the judges they serve cannot. And they fail to reconcile their views with Ex parte Young. The Chief Justice acknowledges, for example, that clerks set in motion the “ ‘machinery’ ” of court proceedings. Post, at 4. Yet
