Back in March a federal judge ordered some polling places kept open because of a major traffic snarl. But the judge controversially did so, without benefit of a complaint, or even a plaintiff.

Today the 6th Circuit dealt with the issue, beginning with the fact that the case had no case name and no plaintiff. Judge Sutton’s opinion for the court made it clear that the judge should not have done that, though he was gentler than SOS Husted was at the time. Judge Sutton wrote:

The district court judge, we realize, was in a difficult spot. She was out of the office. It was late. She had little time to act. All of this presumably led her to err on the side of protecting people’s right to vote. But none of this explains why the clerk’s office or the court couldn’t answer the phone call with the most natural of questions: “Who is it?” And none of this allowed the court to sidestep the Article III limitations on our power. For these reasons, we vacate the district court’s preliminary injunction and remand the matter for dismissal for lack of subject matter jurisdiction.

But the odd case was not fully unanimous. Chief Judge Cole would have simply dismissed the case as moot.