One more question about certiorari, then we'll get to the emergency docket. And that is, again, another wonderful chapter about sort of questioning the conventional wisdom, at least in some quarters, that the vast majority of certiorari petitions are denied. And the conventional wisdom is, or at least the common understanding is, that a denial of certiorari means nothing other than that the court decided not to take the case, and it doesn't have any implications of that other than leaving that case, the case below in place, leaving that decision in place. But you have a great chapter describing and using Obergefell as your central example about how there's lots of strategic, many strategic considerations that can go into assert denial. And then it's too simplistic to say that assert denial is kind of a meaningless act, right? Is that the right setup for that? Yeah.

And because what the same, I mean, so Obergefell versus Hodges, this is the Supreme Court in 2015 saying there's a constitutional right to same-sex marriage. And so the common sort of view is that it's Obergefell that legalizes same-sex marriage on a national basis. The reality is a little more complicated. By the time the court decides Obergefell, same-sex marriage was legal in 37 states. There are only 13 that were left to be directly affected by Obergefell. Jack, half of that as the book documents, right, half of those 37 were, you know, on their own, right, where the either the state democratic process or the state Supreme Court as a matter of state law had legalized same sex marriage. because lower court decisions that had blocked state marriage bans were left intact, were not reviewed by the Supreme Court, right? That there's a series of cert denials on the first Monday of the October 2014 term that basically leads directly to the legalization of same-sex marriage in a bunch of states. Jack, not because the cert denials were precedential, but because the effect of the cert denial was to allow for a final judgment in a whole bunch of states in federal courts that had blocked those marriage bans. So those injunctions went into effect as a result of the cert denials. And part of why I think that's so evocative is because it shows that like, yeah, even without formally creating a precedent, a cert denial can have a massive impact on the ground. The marriage cases, I think, are especially useful because you can actually directly measure that impact by just telling the chronology of when the court denied cert and then when those states started allowing marriages.

Yes. And it's even more than that, because as you point out, the justices, some of the justices who ultimately ended up dissenting in a Burgerfell could have, there were four justices who dissented. And those justices could have voted to grant in those cases.

I mean, right. So if nothing else, we know that at least some of the justices were voting strategically, which, you know, Jack, I mean, anyone who I think follows the court closely will not be surprised to learn that there is strategic behavior in the cert process. But I think for folks who don't follow the court as closely, like here's a very visible example of why and how that happens. Exactly.

So here's my question about that. So is that a good thing or a bad thing? Is it a necessary evil? I mean, again, I don't think you take a position on this, but, you know, the conventional understanding, at least my view is that it would be impossible and unwise for the court to provide opinions for why it denies certiorari. That would defeat the point of having discretion. But a blanket denial can often be used strategically to achieve all sorts of consequences in the lower courts. And is that just a necessary, is it just a necessary product of the system? Is it something we should worry about? I think

the answer to both is yes, that it's a necessary product of the system and it's something we should worry about. Like, you know, again, I think, you know, I don't have a strong view as to whether there are more attractive ways for the court to, you know, sort of shape its docket. I mean, you know, Jack, I think everyone would agree that a large percentage of the cases the court is asked to review are cases that the justices don't need to review. The law is settled. The law is not moving. The petitions are clearly meritless. The tricky part is that there are cases every term where the justices are denying review not because the case is unworthy, but because by denying review, something is accomplished. And I just, I don't know how you can have one without the other, which goes back to why I think it's just important that when we talk about the court, when, you know, people like you and I are teaching our students, when journalists are writing about the court, we don't just sort of accept the denominator, right? The number of cases the court has granted as this, you know, manna from heaven. But rather, we understand that, like, the court's docket is itself a result of very specific, motivated choices that the justices have made that ought to sort of reinforce how we think about what the court is doing as a whole. So, you know, when we talk about, like, how many cases are unanimous versus how many cases are dividing the justices, it's not the norm to contextualize that by saying, of the cases the court chose to hear and the issues the court chose to decide within those cases. So if nothing else, what I'm hoping to do, at least in that part of the book, is change how we talk about the court. I don't know that there are obvious reforms to come out of that, although maybe the more we actually do talk about this part of the court's work, the more that we actually might think there are some small things we ought to do.

What does the future hold for business? Ask nine experts and you'll get 10 answers. Bull market, bear market, rates will rise, fall. Inflation's up or down. Tariffs are in. They're out. Can someone please invent a crystal ball?