Sidebar: Justice Gorsuch and the “Insular Cases”

The History of the Americans

This episode is a “Sidebar,” which is our term for an episode that is off the timeline of the History of the Americans. This episode centers on a concurring opinion delivered by Justice Neil Gorsuch in a case handed down by the United States Supreme Court only a few days ago, on April 21, 2022. The case, United States vs. Vaello Madero, addresses a pretty unexciting question to most of us -- whether the Constitution requires Congress to extend Supplemental Security Income benefits to residents of Puerto Rico to the same extent it makes those benefits available to the residents of the States. That is not the interesting part. Justice Gorsuch's concurring opinion is, however, very interesting, an eloquent re-telling of the history of a series of cases -- the "Insular Cases" -- handed down in the years following the Spanish-American war, the moment in which the United States started dabbling in the European habit of true empire building. The Insular Cases are both an analytical mess and remain on the books as bad law today, as Justice Gorsuch compellingly argues. Enjoy! Selected references for this episode United States v. Vaello Madero Daniel Immerwahr, How to Hide an Empire: A History of the Greater United States Insular Cases (Wikipedia) Plessy v. Ferguson (Wikipedia) U.S. Citizen Vs U.S. National: Differences "Breaker Morant," epitaph scene