Reversing the Order of Battle in Constitutional Torts

Few Supreme Court decisions have been as completely unsurprising as Pearson v Callahan. Pearson overturned Saucier v Katz, which required courts to reach the merits of constitutional tort claims before addressing qualified immunity. Since qualified immunity precludes damages unless defendants violate "clearly established rights," Saucier mandated some merits adjudications incapable of supporting damages judgments in those particular cases, because the rights violated had not been "clearly established" at the time of the defendants' actions. Here, Jeffries examines whether the merits of constitutional tort claims should be adjudicated, even when they do not control immediate outcomes, in order to achieve "clearly established" rights capable of enforcement in the future.