Cisco Systems, Inc. v. Doe · ¶39

Beyond changes in the law, it is hard to see how correcting Sosa’s unfulfilled prediction would upset reliance interests. Any such interests would belong to future plaintiffs— who surely are not relying on the remote possibility that U. S. courts would create an ATS action if they were someday injured and sought one. As for stability, today’s decision promotes rather than undermines it. We have never— not once—created an ATS cause of action. Cf. Edwards v. Vannoy, 593 U. S. 255, 274 (2021) (“No one can reasonably rely on a supposed exception that has never operated in practice”). And given the “high bar” that Sosa set, 542 U. S., at 727, it is a stretch to believe that we ever would have. We thus see no need to “indulge the fiction” that creating new ATS causes of action is sometimes appropriate. Edwards, 593 U. S., at 274. Doing so would “mislea[d] litigants” by suggesting that…

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