Karcher, Speaker of the New Jersey General Assembly, et al. v. May et al.

Decided December 1, 1987. Sandra Day O'Connor delivered the opinion of the Court.

Docket 85-1551 · 484 U.S. 72 (1987) · Cited 308 times

We don’t yet publish a summary of this opinion — read the official text below for the Court’s holding and reasoning.

How the Justices voted

Decided 8–0.

“Concurring” means agreeing with the outcome; any split shown is the Court’s judgment, not each Justice’s reasoning. Source: the Supreme Court Database (Spaeth et al.), Washington University.

Precedents cited

Supreme Court decisions this opinion relies on, ordered by how often it cites each. Cases in our collection link through; others are named.

• Bender v. Williamsport Area School District · 475 U.S. 534 (1986)
• United States v. Munsingwear, Inc. · 340 U.S. 36 (1950)
• Burke v. Barnes · 479 U.S. 361 (1987)
• Kentucky v. Graham · 473 U.S. 159 (1985)
• Lemon v. Kurtzman · 403 U.S. 602 (1971)
• Immigration & Naturalization Service v. Chadha · 462 U.S. 919 (1983)
• Brandon v. Holt · 469 U.S. 464 (1985)
• Mullaney v. Anderson · 342 U.S. 415 (1952)
• Ex Parte Cutting · 94 U.S. 14 (1877)

Cited by

Later Supreme Court opinions in our collection that cite this case.

• Hollingsworth v. Perry · 570 U.S. 693 (2013)
• Virginia House of Delegates v. Bethune-Hill · 587 U.S. 658 (2019)
• U.S. Bancorp Mortgage Co. v. Bonner Mall Partnership · 513 U.S. 18 (1994)
• Cameron v. EMW Women's Surgical Center, P. S. C. · 595 U.S. 267 (2022)
• Berger v. North Carolina State Conference of the NAACP · 597 U.S. 179 (2022)
• Arizonans for Official English v. Arizona · 520 U.S. 43 (1997)
• Lance v. Dennis · 546 U.S. 459 (2006)
• Devlin v. Scardelletti · 536 U.S. 1 (2002)
• Cunningham v. Hamilton County · 527 U.S. 198 (1999)
• Smith v. Bayer Corp. · 564 U.S. 299 (2011)
• United States Catholic Conference v. Abortion Rights Mobilization, Inc. · 487 U.S. 72 (1988)
• United States v. Providence Journal Co. · 485 U.S. 693 (1988)

Official text

Read the official opinion (U.S. Reports, govinfo.gov)

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Source: the U.S. Reports via govinfo.gov; authoring Justice and vote lineup from the Supreme Court Database (Washington University). Citation count from the Free Law Project’s CourtListener bulk data. Data last verified 2026-07-03. Informational only; verify against the primary source before relying. Not a consumer report (FCRA).