Now that Neil M. Gorsuch has joined the U.S. Supreme Court as an associate justice, the prospect of evenly divided rulings from that court should dissipate next term. When the U.S. Supreme Court is evenly divided due to vacancy or recusal, the effect is that the judgment under review is affirmed, but no precedent is created to govern future cases presenting the same issue. The U.S. Supreme Court ordinarily does not issue any opinions setting forth the separate views of the justices in such cases.
If any such evenly divided results were to emerge now from the U.S. Supreme Court in cases that were argued earlier this term when the court had only eight justices, the most likely outcome is that the case would be scheduled for reargument, assuming that Gorsuch was not recused. Such reargument would help guarantee that the Court could decide the questions presented in a way that provided precedent to govern future cases.
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