Reading a Supreme Court Decision

A Supreme Court decision is read in five steps: name the parties, fix the year, find the holding, separate the opinions, and check the precedent's status.

Take a decision. Step one, the parties: the name tells who brought the case — in a criminal case, the charging government leads (Gov 417). Step two, the year, per the course's citation form: *Marbury v. Madison* (1803). Step three, the holding: the specific legal rule the majority announced, stated narrowly — what the case decided, not everything it discussed. Step four, the opinions: only the majority binds; concurrences agree on other grounds, dissents preserve the counterargument (Gov 426), and quoting a dissent as "the Court said" is a checkable error. Step five, the status: precedent binds until overruled, so confirm the holding still stands — *Plessy* was good law for fifty-eight years and is not now. Every step is verifiable at supremecourt.gov or Constitution Annotated, where the opinions themselves are posted.