Uzuegbunam v. Preczewski
The Supreme Court ruled 8-1 that a plaintiff can maintain a federal lawsuit based solely on a claim for nominal damages — even a single dollar — for a past violation of their legal rights, even if the government later cancels the challenged policy.
The decision means government agencies can no longer automatically extinguish constitutional challenges simply by quietly rescinding the offending policy after a lawsuit is filed, leaving plaintiffs with no forum to vindicate their rights.
How it got here: The District Court dismissed for lack of standing; the Eleventh Circuit affirmed; the Supreme Court granted certiorari and reversed.
The Case in Depth
What happened
Two evangelical Christian students at Georgia Gwinnett College, a public school, wanted to share their religious faith on campus. Campus police stopped one student from distributing religious literature and later from speaking in a tiny designated "free speech zone" — even though he had secured the required permit — because complaints had been filed. The college's policies confined expressive activity to areas covering just 0.0015% of campus and barred speech that "disturbs the peace and/or comfort of person(s)." Both students sued college officials for First Amendment violations.
The question before the Court
Can a plaintiff whose constitutional rights were violated keep their federal lawsuit alive by seeking only nominal damages — typically just $1 — when the government has already cancelled the challenged policy and no other relief is available?
The Court's answer
Yes — the Court held that asking for nominal damages satisfies the requirement that a plaintiff seek a remedy capable of actually addressing their injury, which is one of the three things any federal plaintiff must show to get into court under the Constitution.
The Court rooted this conclusion in centuries of common-law history: courts long recognized that any violation of a legal right automatically created some damage, even if impossible to measure in dollars, and routinely awarded nominal damages without requiring proof of financial loss. Because nominal damages are actual money paid from the defendant to the plaintiff — not a purely symbolic gesture — they constitute genuine relief on the merits. This means the two students' lawsuit can continue on the nominal damages claim even though the college cancelled the challenged speech policies before the case was resolved.
Curious how the Court got there? See the step-by-step legal reasoning →
Why it matters
People whose constitutional rights were violated — but who suffered no easily measured financial harm — can now maintain federal lawsuits even after a government entity withdraws the offending policy. This matters especially for free speech, religious freedom, and due process claims, where the real harm is hard to put a dollar value on but is no less serious.
What changes now
The case is sent back to the lower courts. Uzuegbunam's nominal damages claim can now proceed. The district court must separately decide whether the second student, Bradford, also experienced a completed violation of his constitutional rights sufficient to support his own nominal damages claim. More broadly, the decision changes the strategic landscape for constitutional litigation: government entities can no longer extinguish challenges simply by rescinding the disputed policy.
What this does not decide
The ruling does not decide whether Bradford can pursue nominal damages — that question is left to the district court on remand. It also leaves open whether a defendant can immediately moot a nominal damages lawsuit by tendering a $1 payment and accepting judgment against itself, a question several justices flagged but the Court did not resolve.
Concurrences and dissents
Concurrence — Justice Kavanaugh
Justice Kavanaugh agreed with the majority's historical and precedential analysis. He wrote separately to endorse the Chief Justice's view — shared by the Solicitor General — that a defendant should be able to end litigation by simply accepting a judgment for nominal damages against it, without the court ruling on the constitutional merits. He framed this as an important practical safety valve that could limit the advisory-opinion concerns raised by the dissent.
Dissent — Justice Roberts
“The scope of our jurisdiction should not depend on whether the defendant decides to fork over a buck.”The Chief Justice argues the majority's rule lets defendants, not constitutional principles, control whether federal courts can hear a case.
Chief Justice Roberts argued the case was moot: the students had left the college, the speech policies were gone, and no actual damages were claimed. He contended nominal damages provide no real redress — they neither compensate past harm nor prevent future harm, making them purely declaratory in effect. He warned the decision would require federal courts to decide constitutional questions whenever a plaintiff appends a $1 nominal damages request, converting the judiciary into 'the least expensive source of legal advice.' He would have affirmed the lower courts.
How the Court got there
The legal reasoning, step by step
- The Court's starting point was the three-part test every federal plaintiff must satisfy under Article III of the Constitution: (1) a real, concrete injury; (2) a traceable connection between that injury and the defendant's conduct; and (3) a remedy the court can provide that would actually address the injury — the 'redressability' element. Only the third element was in dispute here.
- To decide whether nominal damages can satisfy redressability, the Court looked to what common-law courts — English and early American — had historically done, because the Constitution's 'cases and controversies' requirement has always been understood by reference to the kinds of disputes courts traditionally resolved.
- The historical record showed that the prevailing common-law rule was that any violation of a legal right automatically implied some damage. Courts awarded nominal damages whenever a right was violated, even without proof of actual financial loss. Lord Chief Justice Holt's influential position in an English voting-rights case — that 'every injury imports a damage' — was followed on both sides of the Atlantic, including by Justice Story in early American federal courts.
- The Court rejected the argument that nominal damages are purely symbolic or merely a consolation prize for plaintiffs who tried but failed to prove larger damages. Under the historical rule, nominal damages are the default award for any legal violation — they are real money paid from defendant to plaintiff, they affect the defendant's behavior, and they constitute genuine relief on the merits, not a byproduct of litigation.
- Allowing nominal damages to satisfy redressability prevents the unfair result of protecting small economic rights while leaving important but hard-to-quantify rights — like free speech or due process — without any federal remedy whenever a government entity quietly cancels a challenged policy after a lawsuit is filed.
- The Court explicitly limited its holding to the redressability element alone: a plaintiff seeking only nominal damages must still show a concrete, particularized, past, completed injury and a traceable connection to the defendant's conduct, and must plead a legally valid claim. Nominal damages are not a blank ticket into federal court.
Doctrinal impact
Cases affected by this decision
Reaffirms Farrar v. Hobby (506 U. S. 103)
A plaintiff awarded nominal damages receives actual relief on the merits, not merely a symbolic gesture.
Reaffirms Church of Scientology of Cal. v. United States (506 U. S. 9)
A partial remedy — even a small one — is sufficient to satisfy the redressability requirement for standing.