Skip to main content

Distributed Federalism and the Younger Abstention

Anne Rachel Traum writes that federal courts have begun to — and should continue to — move away from the Younger abstention that has traditionally barred litigants in state criminal proceedings from challenging those proceedings in federal court. She argues that “federalism is baked into the civil procedure infrastructure and courts’ reluctance—institutional, doctrinal, and federalism-based––to order injunctive relief against state courts.” Read more here.